The Queen of Hearts
by defiasstone2
Summary: Sarah Kerrigan ex-Queen of Blades, now leading the zerg once more to get her revenge against Mengsk for causing the death of her beloved Jim Raynor. In the game she becomes much like the Queen of Blades once more, except for a few small parts that show her human side. What if that human part of her was stronger, and reared its head earlier? Oneshot, set on Char, HOTS spoilers!
1. The change of Heart

**The Queen of Hearts-**

The Terran barracks was slowly falling apart around her as she strode further into its depths, thoughtlessly killing the few remaining marines that stood in her way with bursts of psionic energy as swarms of zerglings continued to mop up the remaining Terran resistance in the area. Kerrigan knew she should feel regret at killing so many terrans, but she had told Warfield to withdraw from the planet Char twice now, both when she had made her arrival known and when she had crushed his so called 'Invincible' airforce, so it was as much his fault for the thousands of Terran deaths for not admitting defeat as hers for pressing the assault after he had begun withdrawing the heavy weapons and what remained of his air fleet. Striding down the corridor that lead to the main command centre of the barracks she saw at the end of it an injured medic, her left shoulder armour rent and bleeding and helmet torn off, attempting to heal an injured marine, whose abdomen had been torn open by the now dead zergling in front of the two of them.

The marine was barely conscious at this stage, his life signs dangerously low to Kerrigans enhanced vision, but he still noticed her approach towards them and tried to force the medic to run with his still working arm. To Kerrigans slight surprise the medic shook her head at him, standing and drawing a pistol from her belt and pointing it towards her instead of fleeing or panicking. She paused as a memory hit her of her recent past, lying helplessly in Raynors arms as Tychus pointed a gun at her head under Mengsks orders. Anger boiled up in her at the thought of Raynors fate and she lashed out, batting the medic back into the wall and causing her to drop her weapon. To her surprise the medic forced herself to her feet once more as the zerglings around her stood ready and eager to pounce upon the two terrans and tear them too shreds.

The woman stood in front of the injured marine and glared hatefully at Kerrigan for a moment before speaking slowly in an attempt to disguise her fear. "Well? If you are going to kill us, do it, it was too much to hope that Raynor was right about you!" The zerglings fidgeted and growled at the woman and two of them began to move towards her, unaware of the reaction that the woman's stand and words had elicited inside Kerrigans mind. Memories of her short reunion with the charismatic outlaw flashed through her mind, dozens of encounters in less than a second, one particular moment sticking in her head and resonating throughout her mind.

Flashback: The Hyperion, subdeck level 5

Visions flashed through her mind, screaming marines torn in twain by Ultralisks as civilians tried to flee from the masses of zerglings, each Terran's dying moments filling every last inch of her mind as she awoke covered in sweat, her psionics completely out of control as she jumped between the hyperion and being trapped with the screaming Terrans. Thankfully the crew had created a psionic resistant room for her to stay in, but that didn't save the bed or any of the other items in the room, which were ripped to atoms as the power raged and lashed out at anything it could. Then he appeared, not even dressed in combat armour but his usual casual dress, striding confidently to her both in reality and in her mind, banishing the faces as he walked up to her and grasped her arms firmly. She couldn't hear him at first, her mind still reeling from the nightmare, but eventually what he was saying made itself clear to her. "-rah, Sarah! Calm down darling, you're safe here, don't panic anymore."

She saw him wince slightly as a burst of her power lashed out and opened a cut on his cheek, but his confident gaze never left her eyes as she quickly calmed her powers, the room settling quickly, though the smell of ozone could not be dealt with so easily. She couldn't help but feel deep shame even as she reached up to lightly touch the small cut on his face. "Jim, they came back. I-I, killed them Jim, everything the zerg di..." She stopped as Jim shook his head and looked at her seriously as he reached up and grabbed her hand with his own. "No, Sarah you didn't, the queen of Blades did and that is most definitely NOT who you are." He turned his head and waved off the marines standing at the open door before turning back to her, his eyes lighting up as he looked upon her face once more, causing her to bow her head in shame, unable to look at him with what she had done.

"But Jim, I WAS the Queen of Blades..." His hand let go of hers and she was suddenly terrified of the possibility he was going to admit the truth and then leave her alone in the dark hold once more. She calmed slightly when the hand instead moved to her chin and gently forced her to look up once more at his face. "No Sarah, because you have something the Queen of Blades never had, something that makes you more powerful than she was even with the entire zerg swarm behind her." He smiled at her and she couldn't help but smile back at him before he leaned forwards and kissed her cheek lightly. "Now, I am going to get you some more clothes to change into and then the men can bring in a new bed for you, I don't want anyone else seeing this beauty but me you hear?" Despite her shame and guilt at the situation, the slight possessive tone in Raynors voice made her blush slightly as she nodded and he stood, heading back towards the entrance to the room.

He reach the door and was about to enter the switch code when she called out to him, her mind focussed on what he had said before. "Jim, what is it that you see that separates me from the Queen of blades so much that you were prepared to fight the entire zerg swarm to save me?" He turned, familiar smirk on his face as he pondered his answer for a moment before giving it with a tone so sure of himself that she couldn't do anything but believe the words as well. "Its your emotions Sarah, the Queen of Blades had strength, power and psionics beyond anything I have ever seen, but she did not have your heart and caring, which is why I knew it couldn't be you in control under that skin. Keep that heart Sarah, it is what makes you truly unique regardless of which race you are..."

Flashback end:

Barely a second had passed and the zerglings were gearing up to rend the two terrans to pieces regardless of a lack of her direct orders to do so even as she left the memory, her memories of Jim making her realise how much he would be disappointed with her right now. Fighting and destroying the dominion was something the both of them had agreed on, but despite his outlaw status Jim had never killed anyone who couldn't fight back, or had surrendered to his forces. She raised her hand to above her shoulder, fist clenched in a sign that the zerglings recognised as a stop order even before her psionic commands truly reached them. The medic looked confused and wary even as Kerrigan stared at her for a few long moments, trying to get her emotions and thoughts truly under control once more. Then she placed her hand against her head and sent out her orders to the swarm that were still dealing with survivors.

It was done in seconds and she removed her hand to look at the medic for a moment longer before a smile crossed her face. "Well done medic, you have just made a name for yourself in the history books, now I would get back to treating your patient before he bleeds out, and then you can send a message out for me." The Zerglings were loping down the corridor away from them now, leaving the three alone as the medic shook herself out of her shock and obviously realised that Kerrigan was right, quickly returning to healing the man's heavy wounds. That did not stop her asking a question even as she began to close the man's wound with her equipment. "Not that I am hoping you will change your mind or anything, but I suppose I have to ask why you didn't kill us? I assume its the same as why the comm channels are now filled with reports of the zerg surrounding our remaining outposts but not attacking and destroying them?"

Kerrigan chuckled, she didn't realise that the dominion forces would catch on so quickly, but she supposed it was Warfields troops rather than the usual cannon fodder she had to deal with. Realising that the medic was still waiting for an answer to her question, she decided that honesty was the best approach here, and it might let her sleep a little easier tonight at least. "Simple girl, Jim Raynor saved your lives, you simply reminded me of what he would he would have thought about I was doing. Before he was murdered by Mengsk for trying to save me of course!"

She couldn't help the anger that came into her voice as she discussed Jim's death, she knew that it would never stop hurting the fact that she could have and should have tried to fly to him to save him despite his assurances that he would be fine, noble fool that he had been. The medic looked shocked at the revelation and paused in her healing to look at her with an unreadable expression for a moment before bowing her head once more and returning to her work. "I am sorry to hear that, he was certainly a much different man in person than he had been depicted in Dominion news reports. What happens now then, are you going to let us retreat? Because most of those left behind aren't really in any condition to go anywhere in the near future, and even if we do I imagine the fortress is your next target, so it wouldn't do us much good to run only for you to hunt us down tomorrow."

That was a point Sarah hadn't considered and she was for a moment lost as to what she could do, but then it came to her as the medic finished healing the marine who was thankfully now unconscious and therefore unaware of the situation around him. Stepping forwards, she hefted the marine so that his weight was resting on her shoulder as the medic stepped back cautiously, only for Kerrigan to smirk at her and gesture at the marine. "You have just become the zergs first official prisoner of war, you can at least help me lift him back to where I will be containing you whilst I have a long chat with General Warfield... And this is the message I want you to broadcast to the remaining people in the area, and do it right if you want them to stay alive, I am showing mercy this time, do not make me regret it..."

Persona Change: General Warfield

Sitting in his operations centre trying to come up with a way of defending the bastion against the rapidly growing numbers of zerg that were seemingly coming in this direction, Warfield was cursing the day he had agreed to come to this planet with Jim Raynor and the others, Kerrigan had proven that the zerg menace could not be wiped away even with the power of the Xel'Naga artefact and was now reaping his mistake with the lives of his soldiers. He had turned off his communicator soon after ordering the retreat from the Bone trench, not wishing to hear the reports of what happened to the poor souls that couldn't be extracted in time. If there had been a way for him to cover their retreat he would have taken it, but with his limited resources and men already strained to their limit, he knew that such actions would simply have led to an even greater massacre at the hands of the foul aliens. He was surprised therefore when one of his lieutenants burst into the room, holding a long range communicator in one of his hands. "Sir, you might want to hear this, The Queen of Blades is taking prisoners!" That was a shock to the system, and completely against the zerg mentality of devouring all in their path, it had to be some kind of trick or ploy.

Grabbing the communicator he caught the message just as it began replaying once more. "This is medic Felicity Metrez and I am imploring the remnants of the forces trapped in the canyon of bones to lay down their arms and surrender to the zerg. I speak this free of mind and not under duress, but with the aim of saving lives that would otherwise be wasted pointlessly. The Queen of Blades has sworn that no one who surrenders and does not then try and cause sabotage or escape shall be harmed in anyway, and there are already half a dozen medics here to heal any injured or wounded that you have. I have also been asked to relay a message to General Warfield by the Queen of Blades, it is as follows. 'Warfield, I have given you a way out twice, but you have refused to take them and your men have died for that mistake. The fact that I am taking prisoners and not killing everyone is because you were one of those that risked everything to come and save me from being controlled, but that courtesy will only extend for so long. Leave Warfield and think long and hard about why I am doing this and what Mengsk has done, to me and Raynor.' That is the end of her message and the end of this broadcast, I have set my suit to repeat this broadcast until all resistance in the area is over or General Warfield enters communication with the Queen to begin negotiations with her... This is medic..."

Handing the communicator back to his lieutenant now that it had obviously finished its message, Warfield tried to work out what Kerrigan was trying to accomplish by such a move, prisoners would tie up resources and troops that she could use against him here, but she knew that he could not simply up and leave over a couple of defeats, even with the loss of his main battleships being one of them so they weren't a useful bribe or threatening implement. Seeing no other way of divining her motives, he head past his lieutenant and to the door to the rest of the operations centre, it was time to talk to his deadliest enemy once more...

Persona Change: Felicity Mendez

Looking around the small camp that had been made in the remains of one of the few outposts that had not been overrun by the time the call to surrender had been sent out, Felicity could not help but be impressed by the number of Terrans that The Queen of Blades had actually allowed to live. There were almost 800 people here, most of which were badly wounded marines or medics that had been trying to treat the wounded before the zerg had overrun them, though there were some civilians and marauders to complete the group. Many of them were terrified that the zerg, who had spawned dozens of spine crawlers around their buildings, were going to strike them down at a moments notice and that this was all a ruse by Kerrigan to get them to surrender so that they were easier to kill.

Not that that fact had stopped them surrendering rather than being ripped to shreds by the zerg of course, but the human psyche was almost hotwired to prepare for the worst in any given situation. There was a sudden murmuring through the camp, moving closer to her every second and Felicity could guess what was causing it even before Kerrigan appeared through the buildings with the same supernatural grace that she had used when walking through the barracks the first time that Felicity had met the woman. Standing from her seat, Felicity bowed her head nervously as the Terran's jailer came to a stop in front of her, three zerglings standing like guards behind her, growling at any Terran that got too close. "I assume that you have enough supplies to look after the wounded here? If not then I can have some zerglings escort a group to the ruins to find some more?"

The confidence and commanding tone that was exuded by Kerrigans voice caused Felicity to either salute or drop to one knee by instinct, something that she managed to resist doing, if only barely. She instead nodded and gestured around the camp. "Yes Kerrigan, we have enough supplies to look after these men and feed ourselves for the next three days, and all but the worst cases should either be healed or mostly recovered by that point. Though I have to ask, what of General Warfield? I imagine he was not particularly willing to negotiate with you about leaving Char to the zerg once more, after all we sacrificed to take it..." She trailed off as Kerrigans eyes flared at the reminder of her past persona and Felicity thought for a second that her life was forfeit for her impudence towards their captor, but then Kerrigan's eyes returned to normal and she shook her head with a frown on her face.

"Unfortunately he was unwilling to abandon the planet with his men, and I imagine even if he had that Mengsk would have had most of them executed or turned to the crime legions anyways. So tomorrow I launch the assault on his headquarters and will drive them off this world one way or the other, which is why I am here, to ask your advice." Felicity couldn't help but flinch slightly in shock that the Queen of Blades, champion of the dreaded zerg was here to ask her advice about something to do with the battle against her leader and hero General Warfield.

Trying to work out how to phrase the next sentence so that there was as little chance as possible that Kerrigan would kill her for it, she looked up and shook her head before Kerrigan could carry on after her pause. "I am sorry Kerrigan, as grateful as I am for you sparing the lives of these people and my own, I cannot betray General Warfield and help with whatever you are planning." To her surprise Kerrigan looked surprised at her for a moment before she chuckled and waved her hand dismissively. "Such presumptuous thinking is annoying, even if your loyalty to the man is laudable. What I was going to ask was something slightly different to helping me in the battle, in fact it might save some more lives..."

Timeskip: 12 hours

The zerg had overwhelmed the Terran forces with surprising ease, the sheer numbers and speed of the zergling forces mixed with the sheer destructiveness of the banelings and Abberations swept any form of resistance aside and tore the base asunder, leaving Kerrigan with surprisingly little to do in terms of combat. She had been forced to take to the field initially in order to deal with troublesome siege tanks whose powerful area attacks had disrupted the initial probing attacks of her forces and left them easy prey to the defending marines and hellions. But once past that initial difficulty the swarm had moved too quickly for a second line of effective defence to be mounted, especially with the news that the zerg were accepting surrender from those who threw down their weapons or were too injured to keep fighting.

Once it was clear their defences had been shattered, dozens of dominion troops had thrown down their arms and surrendered, being herded by packs of zerglings to the rear of her lines where they were out of reach for possible rescue or rearmament. She was glad that Medic Mendez had agreed to her second suggestion about the siege, which had been to have squads of captured medics move into the captured area of the base and begin to evacuate the wounded that they found there to be healed, under guard of course to stop any of them trying to escape back to the dominion lines. Kerrigan was glad that the idea of taking prisoners had occurred to her the previous day now, it had reduced the enemies that the zerg had been forced to fight by almost a fifth, and whilst guarding the captives had consumed considerable biomass of her rather limited supply, it had been worth it by reducing the zerg casualties in taking the base by roughly the same fraction.

Stepping up to the badly damaged operations centre with Mendez and half a dozen medics in close proximity as the same zergling that had joined her on Raynors shuttle stalked in front of her, she had to respect the stubbornness of the old veteran and his men, they had certainly made her fight for the planet even if they had probably guessed quite early on that it was futile. She sliced through the wreckage that was obstructing the doorway with her psionic powers and strode inside, wondering whether Warfield had been caught in the storming of the base or was on one of the transports that was currently trying to outrun the zerg forces to the landing pads where their space shuttles were based. The medics began to peel off to search through the outer rooms of the building, their nerves at being around so many zerg organisms gone after day of being surrounded by them almost constantly. Kerrigan headed to where she assumed the main control centre was, if Warfield was anywhere that is where he would be, and she had some words to have with the man before she was willing to let him leave...

Persona Change: General Warfield

Consciousness returned slowly to him and with it so did the pain of his wounds. The command centre had been breached and half a dozen banelings had burst through the corridors, the explosions of acid triggering several further explosions in the buildings fuel supplies and power systems. Opening his eyes he found himself leaning against one of the console centres in the room, the bodies of half a dozen of his most loyal marines laying around him either dead or soon to be. His hearing was a bit slower to return, something he attributed to his old age more than anything else, and when it did he could not repress the sorrow of what he heard, bursts of communications from all his surviving lieutenants that he had placed in the back lines just in case this event occurred.

"All positions are overrun... Landing bay is compromised... We are being surrounded...Argh!" Listening in for a few more moments to get a rough idea of what had happened to the remnants of his force, he isolated one of his lieutenants channels, the man having managed to hold together a small force of hellions to escort a convoy of wounded to the transport area despite the fact that it significantly reduced the chances of the men being able to escape the fast approaching zerg, an action that struck pride within Warfield as it was obvious that his leadership had achieved something. "Lieutenant, I want you to get those wounded to the shuttles do you hear me?"

The man took a second to respond, obviously surprised to hear his voice after the command centre had fallen. "We are nearly there, do you want me to send a squad to pick you up sir?" Looking down at his chest, where a large metal bracket had pierced both his armour and his ribs, stopping barely before his heart, Warfield decided to let the man not worry about him and try and do something stupid like try and rescue him through the zerg swarm that they were escaping from. "I'm fine Lieutenant, you just see to those wounded." He sat up slightly, the movement making the bracket in his chest and the second one in his abdomen shift painfully and put pressure on his lung, though he managed to cover up the pained grunt with a couple of coughs as he put his hand on the bracket. "I'll get out another way..."

There was no response, obviously something had arisen that required the man's personal attention, so Warfield muted his microphone and started to pull on the bracket in his chest, knowing that there was no way he would be able to survive standing with it so perilously close to his heart as it was. The pain was excruciating and he could not stop himself crying out in pain as the bracket shifted outwards in his grip away from his chest. Such was the pain's distraction, it took him a moment to recognise the sound of growling approaching from in front of him and to his horror there was a zergling stalking towards him, its right lower horn damaged in battle but doing nothing to detract from its terrifying appearance.

He knew that he wouldn't be able to move his arm cannon quickly enough to get a shot off at the thing without it leaping at him and tearing him to shreds, and as such he was resigning himself to his fate when the zergling stopped in front of him for a moment, his lieutenant speaking hurriedly into his ears about how the convoy was going to be destroyed by the zerg forces that were nearly upon it. Its eyes were filled with ferocity and hunger staring deeply into his own as if judging whether he was worthy of being prey for it to hunt and devour, before with a flutter of its side fins it jumped off to the side, revealing a woman that Warfield dreaded seeing even more than any number of ravenous zerglings could be.

Finding his voice at last, he sat up as straight as he could so that he could face his inevitable fate in the most honorable way he could manage with his injuries. "Kerrigan, now you listen to me. I have three shuttles packed with men too injured to ever be a threat to you. Husbands, fathers, you let them go, do you hear me?" He didn't know why he tried reasoning with the fallen woman in front of him, he supposed it was due to the belief that Jim Raynor had had in the ex-ghost that had rubbed off on him during their fighting together on Char.  
Seeing the woman still stood there imperiously and unrepentant of the deaths around them his anger suddenly rose within him and he decided to let his feelings be known before the end, rising slightly so that he could point his cannon at the woman. "You bitch! You aren't even human anymore. How many people have you killed, how many more will have to die? And for what, petty revenge? What would Raynor say if he could see you now..." He knew he had gone too far with his last line by the way that Kerrigan stiffened even as her eyes glowed, her psionics lifting him painfully into the air and causing him to shout in pain once more.

Just as he was sure she would finish him off her eyes suddenly shifted away from him as a figure in white ran towards the two of them and he was lowered surprisingly carefully to the floor as Kerrigan looked up and away from him for a moment, Char's sun bursting through the holes in the command centre roof to light her face for a moment, his lieutenant speaking suddenly in his ear as the medic knelt to start tending to his wounds. "Sir, the zerg are retreating, we are going to make it! It is a miracle, General? General?" Ignoring the man's calls for him for the moment, Warfield cast his eye to Kerrigan's back as she started to walk away from him, zergling following like an eager puppy, his mind unable to entirely comprehend what had just happened, though he knew that he had been wrong about the woman, at least as far as his final words had been.

Knowing he had to say something as one armies general to another, he called out to her as she reached the ruined doorway. "Kerrigan, I was wrong about you, and I owe you my thanks for saving my men from my stupidity." Kerrigan stopped and turned back to face him, her eyes hard and unfeeling once more. "Do not thank me Warfield, the dead in this place certainly will not do so if given the choice." And then she was gone from his sight and he was left alone with the medic who he guessed was one of those who Kerrigan had captured the day before, who looked at him with a sad expression on her face. "I am sorry sir, but this is going to hurt quite a lot and then we are going to have to get you back to the camp for proper surgery, otherwise you will not survive the hour."

He sighed as he knew she was right, though he honestly was still getting over the fact that he was still breathing now after what he had said to the former Queen of Blades. He looked into the medics eyes to ask the next question, one that he knew he had to ask for his own conscience. "How many have you managed to save? How many of my men..." He couldn't finish the sentence, feeling the drugs the medic had administered kicking into his system even as she began to cut out the bracket in his chest, but his ears caught her answer, one that further conflicted his thoughts on Kerrigan. "More than a thousand, which is more than we would have accepted from the UED or the protoss in all honesty..." And then his vision blacked out and darkness claimed Warfield once more.****

A/N: I imagine that quite a few people are going to not like how I have done this little one shot, whether how I have portrayed Kerrigan, caused the zerg to keep prisoners or keeping Warfield alive. But with Warfield being the stubborn old idiot he is, which I will admit despite him being one of my favourite characters, I needed to change things before the scene in the command centre to have a hope of keeping him alive. Besides, i like to think that Kerrigan actually does give a damn on some level about how the zerg acts now, something shown in the actual game cutscene in question, I have just brought it in a little earlier... Hope those who read it liked it, leave a review on your way out, I might try and change it from a one shot if people care enough to ask me to... :P


	2. Decisions and meeting the Templar

The Queen of Hearts Chapter 2: Decisions and meeting with the Templar

"And let this be the example to those that think that the dominion is prepared to let the back down and run from the zerg menace, rather than standing and fighting to their last breaths in the name of humanity!" Arcturus Mengsk's voice echoed throughout the crowded but subdued command centre before the monitors returned to the broadcasters studios. The large building, which had been mostly restored to its original condition over the last week by the captured SCV's and surprisingly the zerg drones that Kerrigan had spare, now served as Sarah's stronghold and base of operations on Char. Kerrigan had used this time to finish ensuring her complete control over the remaining zerg forces on the planet, having to deal with a pair of queens that refused to bow to her command over the swarm and had to be brought to heel with force.

Kerrigan had insisted that Mendez take command of the captured Terrans whilst General Warfield was still recovering from his life threatening wounds, having seen the medic at work at the prisoner's camp she knew that the woman could lead if given the opportunity and was also not as afraid of Kerrigan as the other Terrans had initially been. Between the two of them they had ensured the recovery of enough of the ruined buildings to house the captured Terrans whilst the injured recovered and Kerrigan could work out what to do with them. In hindsight her uncertainty on the matter had been a mercy rather than a punishment, given the televised execution of all the non-injured men and women who had escaped in the three shuttles from Char by Mengsk's forces, showing that there was no possible return for them to the dominion after the others capture was revealed.

Kerrigan was sat amongst the Terrans, having been slowly accepted amongst them despite her 'zerg problem' as Mendez had taken to referring her command over the swarm as. Mengsk's rather typical if extreme response left Kerrigan with a problem she hadn't anticipated when she had decided to let the Terran's live, which was what the hell she was to do in their regard. She couldn't in good conscience leave the remaining Terran's on Char, as Mengsk would most likely be sending forces to try and retake the planet soon enough and their survival if that was the case was doubtful considering the footage. But at the same time space on the Leviathan was limited at best, though now she thought about it she supposed she could use some of the accumulated biomass the swarm had obtained whilst gaining control of Char to grow a second Leviathan to house the Terrans inside, which would give her more combat power whilst solving the space problem, admittedly at the cost of most her available zerg forces.

She was broken off from her musing by a polite coughing from behind where she was sat. Spinning round in the chair she found the now Lieutenant Mendez standing there, face drawn and downcast from a week of little sleep and the loss of dozens of wounded, not to mention the executions that she will have undoubtedly just seen. She still saluted when Kerrigan's attention focused on her, something the ex-ghost was not particularly used to, before speaking quickly on the same matter that had been plaguing Kerrigan's mind. "General, I assume you have just watched that travesty? Is this what you meant in regards to Mengsk? Nobody has told General Warfield about this yet, we don't know how he will take the news." The title Mendez used for her was another thing for her to get used to, and one of Warfields almost ironic suggestions once he had awoken from his surgery.

The Terran command structure being as it was, the captured marines needed to refer to her by some sort of title as she was both their captor and faux-ally, weird as that idea was. It had not been long therefore before Warfield had insisted that seeing as how she was head of the zerg 'army' on Char meant she should be of the same rank as him. This was instead of the rank she had been as a ghost as part of the Sons of Korhal, in which she had been a captain before the incident that made her the Queen of Blades. As such she was now 'General Kerrigan' as opposed to the Queen of Blades in the eyes of the captured Terrans, a disassociation that she was rather pleased with, even if it was only a minor change. Bringing her mind back to Mendez's questions she sighed and gestured to her left, where out of the reinforced window the Terran camp could be seen.

"Honestly, I did not expect Mengsk to be this harsh; considering he has just survived the revolt that Jim started I thought he would be desperate for the manpower that you would give him. The fact that he is so determined to drive out anyone who is seen to show weakness to the zerg means that there is no way any of those men will be allowed to live if you return to the dominion as you are. So, as I see it there are three choices available to you all, and none of them are particularly favourable at this point." It was not just Mendez stood there now, the rest of the Terran's in the room were listening to her in rapt silence as she made her point. "The first is that you stay on Char and try your luck in convincing the dominion troops when they arrive that you were actively resisting my forces this entire time, though that is a risky gambit at best. The second is that we try and find out what has happened to Matt Horner and the remnants of Raynors Raiders, they will certainly not turn you away from joining up."

The unspoken disadvantage of this idea did not need to be stated, considering what had happened to Jim when he had been captured. The Terran's seemed to understand her reluctance to speak on the matter as none of them spoke whilst she took a deep breath, trying to work out how best to phrase the last and probably most tenuous choice available. "The third is one that I have not truly given much thought to, but as it is by my work that you are all at such risk I would be prepared to accommodate aboard my ship any who wish to accompany me as I work to reunify the swarm and take down Mengsk." There was not the huge outcry of disgust that she had expected at this, though there was quiet mumbling as each Terran discussed with various degrees of panic the various options to their neighbours.

The room quieted suddenly as an unexpected but familiarly gruff voice spoke from behind Sarah, causing her to turn her head in order to see General Warfield leaning against the frame of the door into the room dressed in marine armour that had obviously been salvaged from several different sets, a medic doing his best to try and keep him standing on his feet whilst apologising quietly to Mendez. "I think that is a choice that we must allow every man and woman to make by themselves, with a madman like Mengsk in charge there can be no easy option, and I don't wish to be held accountable for any more deaths this day."

Eyeing the man who by all rights should still be in a medically induced coma, the man having died twice on the operating table whilst they healed his wounds, his heart stopping long enough to cause serious concern both times, Kerrigan walked over to him and grabbed his uninjured arm near the shoulder as she spoke to him. "You looking good for a corpse Warfield, though I think Mendez is going to have words with you later if that look is anything to go by. Let's get you sat down before you cause yourself a hernia. Everyone that is not a warrant officer or above must leave whilst we plan, make sure that everyone knows about the broadcast, so that they can start to decide what they wish to do next."

The feeling of commanding someone verbally and with charisma was a surprising power rush to her system, definitely more fulfilling than when she had to order the zerg around psionically. There were dozens of salutes and responses of "General!" before they began to move past her and Warfield, many of them saluting the man as well on their way out. Half dragging the man to a seat, she set Warfield down carefully before indicating that those that remained, almost a dozen men and 4 women, should sit themselves down as well.

She looked around, seeing the expressions of fear, anger, disgust and even hope on the faces of those gathered, and she was pleased when Mendez took the initiative to speak her own piece. "As General Kerrigan has stated, we need to decide what we each think is the best approach to the situation and how we will supply ourselves and each of the different groups, should others decide they wish to try and go their own way. So, I think General Warfield should start, as I know many of us respect his opinion in such matters enough that it might influence our own decisions. General?"

Timeskip:

It had been a long day overall but eventually the Terran forces had been split into two different groups, with no one wishing to try and remain on Char for the dominion forces unsurprisingly. General Warfield was heading the group that wished to join up with Matt Horner, and the majority of the Terran's had agreed with him, especially after it was made known that crown Prince Valerian was amongst that group. However the group would be staying on Char until they finished repairing and re-equipping one of the battle cruisers that had been crash landed in the bone trench but not been too badly wrecked by the crash and zerg swarm.

The smaller group of survivors, less than 400 marines, medics and SCV's had chosen to go with Kerrigan under the joint leadership of Lieutenants Mendez and Grahams, a marauder veteran that had also served under Warfield during the invasion of Char. Kerrigan had changed her mind and nearly insisted on the Terran's all going to join Horner once it became clear that only a small number were going to serve with her, but Mendez had argued that it would make further attacks on dominion territory easier for her and the swarm if there was a human presence amongst their forces to promote further defections and surrendering.

The idea had a lot of merit, especially if she needed to attack areas that had been part of the uprising against Mengsk, so she relented and had the Leviathan altered so that it was more suitable for normal human habitation. This had in turn caused a stir amongst her Zerg commanders, who had refused to integrate with the Terrans before now, Za'gara in particular unable to comprehend why they had not just devoured the humans for their biomass to strengthen the swarm further. Luckily her control over the swarm was more than sufficient to quieten Izsha and Abathur, though she had been forced to remind Za'gara of her place psionically before the brood mother had bowed to her orders. They had packed several barracks and factories aboard the Leviathan so that equipment for the Terran forces could be reproduced and the Terrans could be housed on whatever planet they landed on next, leaving the remaining buildings for Warfield's forces to use.

She could not afford to tarry any longer however, Mengsk's forces were growing stronger by the second and she had already lost enough time on Char. As such she had ordered the Terrans to be ready to leave by nightfall as thousands of zerglings; banelings and aberrations flocked back to the grounded Leviathan for loading. Now she had one thing left to do before she could leave, and this would take quite the bit of power to achieve...

Persona: Matt Horner, Captain of the Hyperion

Reaching up to rub at his tired eyes once more, Matt was thankful that they seemed to have finally managed to shake Nova's pursuing forces, for the time being at any rate. Looking over to Valerian, he noted that the once pampered prince looked as bad as he felt, both suffering from the loss of Jim and Kerrigan. Though he could hardly blame the woman for acting how she did when she found out they had been forced to leave Raynor behind to the Dominion forces. According to the reports Jim had acted similarly when she had first been lost to the zerg after the disastrous attack on Tarsonis, though admittedly the man hadn't had ridiculously strong psionics to throw those around him into walls.

As if on cue to his thoughts, the screen in front of him suddenly crackled and flared, waves of light bathing from it for a few moments before a familiar face appeared, looking haggard and breathing hard from the effort of opening such a communication. "Kerrigan!" He said, louder than he intended as every person on the bridge flinched whilst turning to look in his direction, and he waved them off back to their work as Valerian approached the screen cautiously. "Matt, Valerian. I hope you don't mind if I skip the niceties a little, you were further away than I imagined when I tried to set up this link. I am contacting you from Char, which I have retaken from General Warfield's forces." Valerian frowned and spoke up angrily at this point, not that Matt was particularly surprised, the young man had been close to the former general, whose death and prompt hero's burial had been broadcast live from Korhal despite the lack of a body. "Why did you have to kill him Kerrigan? And all of those soldiers under his command. Was it really just to gain some of your zerg back?"

Kerrigan levelled a pointed glare at Valerian, causing the man to take a step back subconsciously before she responded. "You should know by now Prince not to believe everything that your dearest father has posted on the news channels. Warfield is in fact still alive, though I doubt he will be able to take to the battlefield again considering the injuries he sustained. He and almost 1500 hundred Terran's are currently rebuilding a Battle cruiser on Char in order to come and join your little rebellion, which was the reason I have contacted you, so remember this in future before thinking the worst of me, again!" Though Valerian looked sufficiently cowed at this angry diatribe, Matt noticed the hurt in Kerrigan's posture as she spoke to them about Warfield and his men, implying something he couldn't quite fathom. He decided to move the conversation to more important matters rather than let the two of them continue squabbling, including one that he didn't really wish to broach but knew he owed it to Jim's memory.

"Kerrigan, as glad as I am to hear that you have taken those men alive rather than just killing them, I have to ask, have you heard..." He trailed off, unsure of how to truly broach the topic as Kerrigan noticeably sagged on screen and the connection flickered for a few moments before it solidified and she replied to his unspoken question. "About Jim? I know well enough Matt." Her voice was softer than her usual playful and slightly arrogant tone, filled with emotions he was sure she had long since forgotten about. "That is why I am taking back control of the swarm, Mengsk must be stopped from continuing these actions and after your rebellion failed and with Jim... Gone, that task now falls to me. I will be taking the swarm to the planet of Kaldir in order to reunite with one of my brood mothers there before I plan my next move, and I hope that I can count on you and the Raiders support when the time comes Matt. Against Mengsk, I will need every bit of help that I can get."

The picture flickered for a moment longer and then faded to nothing once more before a reply could be made, leaving Matt to his thoughts for a moment before Valerian spoke up in a surprised tone. "That is certainly not the same Kerrigan we knew before the Umojan incident, and I think I can say that is a good thing. Shall I get the ship ready to travel to Char then?" Matt nodded distractedly, his mind struggling to comprehend that Kerrigan was once more in charge of the zerg, and that in Raynors memory he may end up fighting beside the very things he had fought against for so long to take down Mengsk. Shaking his head, he stood straight once more and made his way to the helm computers to take control of the ship once more, if Warfield wanted to sign up he was certainly not going to refuse the manpower...

Timeskip:

Location: In orbit above Char

Kerrigan was sat on a seat like protrusion in the floor of the room she was resting in, that served as the resting quarters for her and the Terran officers, who were for the most part undertaking drills and exercises aboard the leviathan to stay combat effective. The original zergling was there with her, sat with its head in her lap like a faithful hound. It had been another difficult night for her, though the presence of so many links to the zerg had helped her stabilise her powers, so though she had woken in a cold sweat she hadn't torn the room part again, which was good considering the number of people she could hurt that were nearby. Suddenly her zergling raised its head and growled in warning; a second later she felt a familiar presence in the room, one that she had almost as bigger reason to dislike as Arcturus.

"Zeratul…" She spoke the name with malice as the protoss dark Templar appeared from the shadowed realm through which the protoss travelled, though she placed a hand on one of the zerglings pincers to prevent it from attacking, Zeratul would be able to rip it apart with little difficulty if he wished. The dark Templar simply stood there in silence for a moment, leaving Kerrigan to make the first move. She leapt to her feet, charging across the cavern with a rage filled yell, slamming her fist into his chest, following it up with a vicious roundhouse kick that sent the protoss flying backwards for a moment before she reached out with her powers, grasping hold over his form and dragging him back, past her and slammed him into one of the supporting pillars of the room.

Even as she leapt into the air, she wondered why he was not fighting back, he certainly would be able to stop her if he wished. Zeratul had gone toe to toe with her more powerful Queen of Blades form after all. That did not matter right now however, as she spun in the air before launching herself downwards towards him, fist glowing with light yellow psionic energy. This caused Zeratul to react she was pleased to note, obviously fearful of the damage such an attack could do to him. To her surprise however, rather than ignite his psy-blade and cut her down, he merely deflected her lunge so that her fist impacted on the pillar above his right shoulder, cracking it heavily and releasing an explosive burst of air from the impact before he forced her back with his feet.

She recovered quickly and attacked him again before he had time to react and this time her fist did not miss its mark, slamming Zeratul through the pillar and tumbling to rest almost twenty feet away from her. He seemed a little stunned as she walked up to him, the fleshy door to the room bursting open at this point allowing Mendez and Horace to enter with weapons drawn, half a dozen marines behind them and they fanned out into the room. Holding up her hand to show they were not to attack, she reached down and grasped the front of Zeratul's armour, dragging the protoss up into a sitting position so she could look him in the eyes as she growled her questions to him. "What do you want? And why did you not defend yourself?"

Zeratul did not respond for a moment and Kerrigan felt her earlier anger return to her, raising her fist ready to punch some of the pompous arrogance out of him when he spoke slowly and unsurely. "I will show you Kerrigan, if you make sure the humans do not shoot me for what I am about to do, they might not understand our methods…" Zeratul was obviously surprised at the Terran's presence aboard the Leviathan, and it made Kerrigan glad that she had obviously done something to surprise the ancient warrior who had so often read her like a book despite her best efforts to surprise him. Looking across at Mendez, who was stood with pistol ready but had obviously heard the conversation, she didn't need to say anything for the medic to nod in understanding and give a quiet order to stand down. The marines listened to her and lowered their weapons, though none of them moved to leave the room, obviously not trusting Zeratul despite her assurances.

She turned back to Zeratul whose expression had changed to something approaching respect. "You command their respect rather that lead through fear, I must say that I am surprised. However, I now require you to open your mind, and believe!" As he said the last word his hand shot up faster than she could react and locked round her head, causing the Terrans to raise their weapons once more even as her vision changed to that of star systems and supernovas, travelling millions of light years before settling on a single world. Zeratuls voice spoke from all around her as the world spun in front of her. "Kerrigan, I have been to the beginning." The scene changed to a jungle whose plants she did not recognise even with the knowledge of her previous self to draw from, vibrant and rich whilst eliciting a dangerous and feral feeling down in her very soul.

"Behold, Zeras, birthplace of the zerg. Here the zerg evolved." The sounds of movement became more and more audible to her before in the next moment two beast like creatures appeared into her view, the first smaller and dog like, with three sets of eyes and a long mouth ending in a sharpened protrusion. The second creature was pursuing the first, larger and stockier than the first animal with large and powerful front arms that it dragged it's body forwards upon to try and capture the smaller creature. Zeratul spoke as the pursuit continued, the smaller creature ducking through roots whilst the larger one was forced to jump over them instead, the smaller creature beginning to glow as it ducked into a tunnel of roots, seemingly leaving its pursuer behind and unable to catch it. "This is where the dark one altered them. Those that are left are the primal zerg."

Suddenly a large claw burst through the roof of the tunnel and grabbed the smaller zerg, dragging it from its escape route and holding in front of its predator. The smaller zerg snapped at the larger one twice before the larger zerg tossed it through the air, pursuing after it before it could recover.

"They fight." The two beings charged towards each other, the larger one grabbing the smaller one by the neck and slamming through the undergrowth, where it was stopped of Kerrigans direct sight, though the sounds of ripping and tearing made it obvious what was occurring.

"They Kill." Her view shift so that she could see the larger zergs face as it ate some of its fallen prey, its form shifting before her eyes as two more eyes appeared on either side of its original eye.

"They evolve." The things body contorted and glowed with the same light as the smaller zergs body had, it's mass increasing and body becoming more streamlined as it roared out into the wilderness around it.

The vision faded and Zeratul let go of her face once more, but not before he spoke his final piece to her. "As must you, if you survive…" There was silence for a moment longer before Mendez spoke up hesitantly.

"General, are you okay? What shall we do with the… ah damn it." As she had been speaking Zeratul faded into the shadows once more, leaving the Terrans alone once more. She could have stopped him leaving with her powers, though she had no desire to harbour the Templar any longer than was absolutely necessary. Whilst she was okay with Terrans now to a certain extent, something about Zeratul drove her to a rage similar only to her feelings towards Jims death or Mengsk's betrayal, and she honestly could not place why.

Standing once more she nodded her head at Mendez, both in thanks and to show she was fine. "I am fine Lieutenant, though I appreciate the actions of you and your men by coming to my aid. How did you know he was here?" Mendez shrugged and gestured to the door. "The creepy snake like one told me you had company whilst I was up at the head, and seeing as none of your zerg were rushing to help you I decided this was either very serious or a test for us, so grabbed those I could on the way here." Kerrigan nodded, knowing exactly why none of the zerg had come to attack Zeratul, it had been the only order she had sent out before engaging him in close quarters. "They did not come on my orders and with good reason. If he had wanted to, the protoss could have destroyed us all, me included even with my powers as strong as they are."

That caused the group of them too shift slightly nervously, obviously they had not face many a protoss whilst serving in the dominion, not that such a lack of experience was surprising. It was rarely the marines that survived such conflicts, the protoss zealots would always cause terrible casualties to any force of infantry that were not sufficiently protected by armour or bunkered up. "But Zeratul has proved himself a boon, as much as it pains me to admit it. I now know what our next step after Kaldir shall be, and I imagine it will come as quite the surprise to you…"

**A/N: Right, after the reviews I have received (almost as many for this chapter as my second largest story in its entirety!) I decided to dabble my hand in continuing this story, and immediately found how hard it was to do so for a variety of issues. The prisoners were impossible to deal with without killing them off out of hand or having them turn against Kerrigan at somepoint, and though I have addressed this by having the execution turn them against Mengsk I am still not happy with it. **

**If I am to continue this I will be planning on branching out from the main storyline after Zeras, I do not like the cop out method that they used to deal with Mengsk's main bases of power (The random brood mothers who just somehow manage to overwhelm an enemy they have been hiding from just because Kerrigan says they must seems a bit weak if I am honest.) Therefore Kerrigan will be fighting her way through Terran space to Korhal rather than just turning up and crushing everything in front of her.**

**This chapter may well change if I come up with a better way of writing it later on, but for now this is the best I have to give to you, the readers. Please review and tell me whether you think I have changed Kerrigan to fast, to slow etc etc. If you don't like it tell me why and what you would have done instead so that I can keep it in mind for future chapters. Also, anyone with any idea how to deal with the Kaldir Protoss in another way other than the 'canon' method feel free to bring it up. :)**


	3. Kaldir, Protoss and a surprise or two

_Previously on The Queen of Hearts:_

_Standing once more she nodded her head at Mendez, both in thanks and to show she was fine. "I am fine Lieutenant, though I appreciate the actions of you and your men by coming to my aid. How did you know he was here?" Mendez shrugged and gestured to the door. "The creepy snake like one told me you had company whilst I was up at the head, and seeing as none of your zerg were rushing to help you I decided this was either very serious or a test for us, so grabbed those I could on the way here." Kerrigan nodded, knowing exactly why none of the zerg had come to attack Zeratul, it had been the only order she had sent out before engaging him in close quarters. "They did not come on my orders and with good reason. If he had wanted to, the protoss could have destroyed us all, me included even with my powers as strong as they are."_

_That caused the group of them too shift slightly nervously, obviously they had not face many a protoss whilst serving in the dominion, not that such a lack of experience was surprising. It was rarely the marines that survived such conflicts, the protoss zealots would always cause terrible casualties to any force of infantry that were not sufficiently protected by armour or bunkered up. "But Zeratul has proved himself a boon, as much as it pains me to admit it. I now know what our next step after Kaldir shall be, and I imagine it will come as quite the surprise to you…"_

Chapter 3: Kaldir, Protoss and a surprise or two...

Location: Kaldir

Well this was probably the least hospitable planet that she had ever been on, and that was including Char and the gas world of Morkresk 5 Kerrigan thought with a small amount of humour as the Leviathan came into atmosphere. At least on the poisonous world the zerg had quickly evolved to counter the gases lethal effects, allowing them to overrun the Terran mining operations there in the name of the Overmind. that had been one of the smaller operations she had been a part of before the Overminds destruction at the hands of the protoss forces and her ascension to the position of the Queen of Blades.

Looking out towards the frozen spires of a zerg lair, which were sticking out over the ice ridden plains in are rather obvious manner, it was very clear what had probably happened to the brood mothers forces that resided here. Kerrigan knew that she would have to work out a way of protecting her forces from the intense cold before they could truly try and unite the zerg forces here with the swarm once more. Reaching out psionically, Kerrigan couldn't help but feel a slight sense of panic as her powers registered the presence of other psionically powerful groups on the planet, many more than just that of the singular brood mother she had been expecting.

Breaking the connection before the groups noticed her probing, she looked over to where Mendez was stood next to Za'gara, who was still struggling to deal with the Terran's presence aboard. Kerrigan spoke slowly, reaching up to massage her forehead as she knew that the mission had just become far more complicated. "Well, just when I thought things couldn't become more difficult for us, we have a large Protoss force present on the planet below and conditions that can render even the zerg inactive."

She paused to think about her next orders for a moment longer before she nodded to herself and spoke once more. "Mendez, come with me, I need to see Abathur before we do anything else. He must have a way of getting around these environmental conditions, or at least mitigating their impact upon us. If only Zeratul had remained aboard i would not have to concern myself with this problem. I would prefer not to bring the golden armada down on our heads over such a small brood."

She knew the dark Templar was something of an outcast amongst his own kind for some of his actions during the war against the Overmind and then her. Despite this he still held the grudging respect of many of the Protoss, especially amongst his dark brethren, both for his teaching of Tassadar and his other actions as a leading figure of the dark Templars. With him present there would have been the possibility of negotiation, but instead she would have to try and make the stubborn and prideful race see reason by herself.

Za'gara chose this moment to speak to her telepathically, her voice confused but also containing a slightly disdainful undertone that Kerrigan could easily pick out. "My Queen, I thought you wished for revenge against the leader of the Terran forces, but there are no Terrans here for us to slay?" Sighing at the question Kerrigan replied out loud even though she knew she could have replied mentally. "Nafashs brood has several powerful adaptations amongst her forces. I need these forces to strengthen the swarm if I am going to take down Mengsk."

Za'gara looked affronted at this, her hands moving in what was obviously an agitated manner in front her, rearing up slightly even as she responded. "Surely my brood would be enough to defeat his forces that he could array against us, Terran's are weak!" Kerrigan didn't know whether to be angry at the not so subtle insult that Za'gara had thrown at her and the other Terran's aboard, or to laugh at the comment which was flawed to its very core, especially considering who was making that particular comment.

Deciding against the most humiliating reply, which was to point out that the 'weak Terrans' had very much driven Za'gara's brood to near extinction simply by letting the brood mother throw her forces against their positions in her pathetic version of tactics. Kerrigan wasn't going to let the matter rest entirely either in case the brood mother grew even bolder in her attempted mockery. She turned her head, glaring over at Za'gara with a hint of psionic power behind it as she put the brood mother in her place.

"That is what you used to think about me isn't it Za'gara? Perhaps it is not your swarm being weak that is the problem with your idea…" She trailed off and let her own more subtle insult rest in the air as she turned her head back to the planet in front of her, returning to the problem of how to begin her operations here.

Thinking about it a moment longer she activated her comms unit in her ear, which connected to the communications hubs that the Terrans now had spanning the Leviathans interior. "Lieutenant Horace, get a squad of marauders and medics together for a mission, and make sure they are equipped with the vacuum capable suits as opposed to the normal equipment. Otherwise they will not survive for long on the planet below. I will get some zerglings ready to head in via spore transport ahead of you."

Horace acknowledged and she removed her hand, only for Mendez to ask a question of her own. "What about you General? You certainly cannot go out there in that skin suit, even with your zerg adaptability you would be dead before we made true landfall." That was something she hadn't considered, too used to the immunity that being the queen of blades had granted her from such conditions.

With that in mind she made a detour towards the Terran sector herself, she would need a suit of her own in all likelihood, and then she could see to getting the zerg ready to reclaim Nafash's brood and if necessary crush the protoss forces before they could escape, something she knew would be highly likely…

Timeskip:

"Death to the Queen of Blades, For Aiu…urgh!" As another protoss zealot charged futilely towards her, only to be taken down by the mass of evolved zerglings that blocked its path, Kerrigan couldn't help but curse the hatred and pride that the protoss had for her and the zerg. She had landed quietly on the planet not far from Nafash's hive cluster, intent on finding a suitably powerful indigenous creature whose essence could be used to adapt the swarm to the flash freezes that swept the planet.

*Flashback*

Kerrigan was very glad that she had listened to Mendez now and had worn a heavy Terran vacuum armoured suit that was capable of insulating the user even in deep space. The reason for her happiness was that the fast cooling temperatures had killed almost half of her zerglings when it struck them for the first time, which was before they reached the Ursadon Matriarch and retrieved its essence for Abathur to use in evolving the swarm.

The thing had proved little challenge under the combined weight of Kerrigan's psionics, the marauders grenades and the acid attacks of the feral roaches that she had assimilated into her swarm. The Matriarch and her two smaller beasts only managing to fell a single zergling before it fell a bloody lump of flesh, the smaller Ursadon's perishing moments later. The remaining zerglings quickly feasted on the flesh, Abathur using the psionic links to each zergling to obtain the Ursadon's DNA strands for sequencing to the swarms needs.

It took a few minutes to complete the evolution, even for the master geneticist of Abathurs calibre. In that time Kerrigan and her team had advanced up the icy cliffs to the location of the hive cluster that had been left damaged and frozen by the cold. It was interesting however that the cluster was mostly untouched by combat, meaning it had been abandoned by Nafash before the Protoss had attacked it, something Kerrigan found very strange from the by all accounts tactically brilliant Brood mother.

Shaking off her concern at the weirdness of the situation, Kerrigan reached out with her mind and connected to the various structures that made up the cluster, in order to bring them back under her control and also to allow Abathur to initiate the evolution he was finishing to the building as well as her troops.

Once he was ready Abathur sparked the change in all of the zerg currently on the planet down to the last Larvae. The buildings warped and grew, growing thicker and wider as a fur like carapace was grown over all the extruding surfaces, giving the cluster a strange almost non-zerg feel to it. Kerrigan was distracted from these changes as she felt the presence of dozens of minds suddenly focus on the area of the cluster, obviously having sensed the large amount of psionic energy being used to facilitate the evolution.

A more powerful presence shifted through her psionic shielding, which extended almost 100 yards from her in every direction. The presence stopped a few yards in front of her, forming into an astral projection of a Protoss High Templar. His telepathy was filled with confusion and disdain as he stared across at her. "What is this? The Queen of Blades? But your form is different, weaker, human-like." Despite the urge she felt to rip the Templars mind to pieces at his arrogant tone, Kerrigan decided to at least try the diplomatic route.

Bowing her head respectfully, she managed to keep her tone level as she spoke slowly and clearly. "Noble Templar, I do not wish to fight you and your kind on this forsaken planet, simply to remove any remaining zerg that might reside here before leaving quickly and quietly. There need be no blood spilt this day." For a moment she thought it had worked, the Templar looking around at the gathered marauders and medics with confusion evident in his body language. But then his face hardened and he raised his hand to point threateningly at her.

"You must pay for your crimes against our race Queen of Blades, we remember Aiur, and we remember your actions after the death of the Overmind. We cannot let you take control of the swarm again no matter what. So prepare yourself for judgement, for the golden armada will be here as soon as we contact Shakuras." And then the projection faded as the Templar retreated, leaving Kerrigan to groan at what had happened. "Izsha, please tell me that the protoss cannot reach Shakuras psionically?"

*End Flashback*

It turned out that the Protoss couldn't contact Shakuras straight away, though Izsha then dampened this good news by reporting that the protoss had constructed several psionic towers that could act as amplifying relays once properly charged with psionic energy to achieve contact with Shakuras. It was these towers that were beginning to charge as Kerrigan had prepared the hive cluster for battle, the Protosses plan almost painfully obvious to her.

She had destroyed the closest tower with surprising ease, the protoss seemingly unable to counteract the flash freezes, even if their advanced psionic powers protected them from the worst of the cold damage. Therefore Kerrigan had unleashed a swarm of zerglings and roaches to lead the charge as the first flash freeze of the battle occurred, tearing through the frozen protoss with almost sickening ease.

She had left the Terrans at the zerg base to do what Terran's do best, which in her mind was static defence. A couple of SCV's and bunkers were deployed from orbit at the entrance to her base, in order to defend against any attackers that might threaten it whilst she was out attacking the various Protoss bases. Leaving the now wrecked protoss base that had been built up around the psionic tower, Kerrigan radioed in the co-ordinates and a medi-vac appeared a few minutes later. SCV's descended from it in order to begin working on building a command centre and some more bunkers to defend the location whilst the Terrans began mining for their own minerals to use.

Confident that the Terrans could create the rest of the base by themselves, she continued to advance with her forces, taking out small pockets of Protoss forces that seemed to be at key crossroads in the canyons. She decided to wait until flash freezes occurred before attacking what seemed to be a defensive garrison in front of the second base she knew contained a psionic tower.

The time lost waiting easily worth it for the number of zerg forces that it saved from dying trying to break through the protoss defences and destroying the second tower before the flash freeze ended. She got her forces to concentrate on the more dangerous Protoss such as the Archons and the key power pylons before the storm ended, the few remaining forces proving little challenge when they thawed out.

Hearing the sound of Ursadon howling in the distance, Kerrigan smiled all to herself as Abathur mentioned the need to gather more Ursadon Matriarch essence in order to truly counter the effects of the flash freezes and have the swarm at full functionality once more, this would be more fun than killing more protoss at least.

The thing was prowling around the cliffs above them, and thought itself safe from her and her troops until they segmented a bit so that it could target the weaker elements of the group. That just wouldn't do, she was on a time scale after all. With a telepathic command she directed a group of forty odd raptor strain zerglings bounding up the cliffs to deal with it, though she was disappointed that she wouldn't get to slay the mighty creature herself.

Shaking her head to clear her mind she received a communication from Mendez, stating that the Terran base was now established and she was leading a squad of marines and marauders to join Kerrigan as fire support to complement her close range forces. As small as the force would be in comparison to her zerg forces, Kerrigan didn't say anything as she knew it was hard enough for the Terrans to coexist with the zerg let alone fight with them, so the fact that they were willing to do so was a good sign.

Whilst the Terrans were on their way she led her forces deeper into the cliffs, killing the protoss forces there with a mixture of overwhelming numbers and Kerrigans psionic abilities. Just as she unleashed a kinetic blast that destroyed the shields of the last Archon in the area, she sensed an almost familiar presence nearby, one that was of zerg origin rather than of protoss. It was incredibly weak however, and if it weren't for the fact that she was used to separating out psionic presences when dealing with the swarm she would have lost it as it faded a little more.

Thoroughly intrigued, she got most of her forces to hold at the entrance to the canyon she felt the presence inside of, taking half a dozen zerglings and heading off into the ice, carefully scanning for protoss in case this was some very clever trap they were pulling. The canyon did not stretch too far into the Ice flow, and after five hundred metres or so she could see it narrowing to a large bluff at its end.

It was the frozen figure at the base of the bluff that caught her attention and she approached slowly to the corpse of the brood mother Nafash, who had obviously fled into this canyon to try and escape the protoss forces. Looking closer at the corpse Kerrigan realised Nafash seemed to have died of flash freezing as opposed to protoss blades, not that the fact made her death in anyway better or meaningful...

Kerrigan suddenly realised that the psionic presence she was feeling came from below Nafash's corpse, rather than from it which she had expected, thinking it just the fading presence of the brood mothers psionic presence. Focusing entirely on the feeling, she reached out and felt her surroundings, and true enough there was a chrysalis less than three feet into the ice below the frozen corpse. She could feel Nafash was weak, near death even and her condition worsening slowly, but there was still enough time if she hurried.

Pointing to the ground above the chrysalis she lifted the frozen corpse aside and ordered her zerglings to dig up the chrysalis carefully before reaching for her earpiece. "Mendez, I need a transport here as soon as possible, I have found Nafash and she is alive, if only just. Send it to the coordinates that we agreed to rendezvous at, my forces have cleared the area there, and we can send Nafash back to the hive cluster to be healed whilst we destroy the other towers."

A bark told her that the zerglings had finished digging up the chrysalis even as Izsha spoke to her psionically. "My Queen, another flash freeze is inbound and the chrysalis will not survive the conditions given how low Brood mother Nafash's readings are." That was not good news, though she knew she still had enough time if they hurried.

Reaching for her earpiece again she spoke quickly. "Mendez, get the pilot to step on it, another storm is incoming and Nafash will not last through it in the open." There was an acknowledgement that was lost upon her as she felt the forces at the entrance to the canyon come under attack from a sizable protoss force, obviously intent to try and destroy her army so that they could not attack during the flash freeze and the protoss were defenceless.

Raising the chrysalis with her powers as the zerglings rushed out to join the fight, Kerrigan strode towards the canyon entrance confidently, hearing the sounds of guns joining the battle indicating that Mendez had arrived faster than expected to aid her. The first protoss she saw, a stalker that had been attempting to flank some of her roaches, fell to a kinetic blast even as she set the chrysalis down out of the way, so that she could unleash her full fury at the prideful fools in front of her.

The battle finished quickly and Kerrigan remained with at least half of her zerg force, whilst the Terran's had two injured from stalker fire and had to be extracted by the same transport that took the chrysalis. The flash freeze set in and Kerrigan knew that the pilot would wait until it had finished before trying to return to base, it wasn't like it was threatened in the current conditions by any of their enemies.

Setting aside all other worries for the moment, Kerrigan set her sights on the second psionic tower, which she could both feel and see in the distance in front of them. Without a spoken word the zerg charged forwards, determined to kill as many protoss whilst the storm lasted and to destroy the towers before they could reach Shakuras psionically. She had tried to be reasonable with them and they had spurned her, now was the time for vengeance and war to lead, things that the zerg were very very good at…

Timeskip:

It had taken a lot of effort and many zerg lives, but they had finally taken the third and final tower and broken the protoss presence in the area. As much as she didn't want to at this point, she reached out with her mind and found the same protoss presence as before, this time sending her own psionic manifestation to the Templars location. Appearing in her human form, she bowed as the Templar visibly fumed in front of her.

"Templar, you dictated that we must battle this day and we have, now do I need to wipe out your retreating forces in the area or are you going to see reason and realise that perhaps I am no longer the Queen of Blades?" As much as she realised that it would just be easier to crush the protoss forces rather than try and work out a deal with them, the non-violent method would conserve bio-mass and possibly secure her more allies against Mengsk and the dominion, both things which would be useful in the future.

The Templar seemed to be set on his decision however as he shook his head, though she noticed a couple of the other Protoss nearby look a little shocked when he did so. "All of the remaining protoss military forces in the area have been gated away after you took down the towers, but we shall contact Shakuras another way, of that you can be sure Queen of Blades. As much as you try and coat your words with sugar and expect me to believe them, I was there when you betrayed Fenix and I shall not make the same mistake he did again."

Another of protoss stepped forwards, this one an obviously younger protoss in the armour of a zealot, speaking in the protoss native language Khalani, one that Kerrigan knew just well enough to understand the words he was speaking through his link to the Templar she was listening in on. "But Commander, the children cannot be gated… and many of the civilians refused to abandon…"

Kerrigan didn't need to hear anymore, breaking her connection to the construct she immediately issued a fall back order to the zerg forces that had been slowly moving through the very large protoss base destroying the buildings in their path as she tried to negotiate once more. Looking through their minds, she quickly realised that behind the military structures that the zerg had pretty much destroyed, there were what she had to describe as the protoss equivalent of supply bases for the Terrans, places for them to stay when outside of battle. Protoss didn't have to worry about this as they could usually gate back to their ships easily enough, so their presence meant that the protoss presence here was more than just an expeditionary force of their military.

Outlining what she thought she had discovered to Mendez, she lead the Terran's forwards through the now burning base and to the first of these housing buildings, which had thankfully only been superficially damaged by her roaches by the time she had issued the fall back order. The door was armoured, but nothing to Kerrigan's powers, casually ripping through the door before striding inside. Inside she found half a dozen zealots standing defensively in front of almost thirty unarmoured protoss including 8 that were small enough to probably be children.

Just as the zealots looked like they were prepared to charge forwards and the Terrans readied their weapons, Kerrigan held up a hand and spoke quickly, the beginnings of a plan to deal with the protoss problem forming in her mind. "Do not attack us Protoss; if you do you know that my forces will destroy you and those that you wish to protect as well." The leading zealot paused, obviously eying up the arrayed firepower in front of him and the sounds of her zerg forces in the distance, but still glared at her as he spoke his next words.

"And you will do that of whether we attack first or not Queen of Blades, just because you have these Terrans fooled does not mean that I will fall for your tricks. Why would you offer us mercy after attacking our forces as you did this day?" Though obviously hostile, the zealot was at least asking questions rather than attacking straight away, and if he thought she had been the one to attack, then she had the chance to prove him wrong and possibly sway his opinion a little.

She stepped forwards slightly, noting the zealots stiffening as she did so, causing her to stop once more and speak slowly but firmly. "I did not initiate the attack today, your leader did even after I spoke to him to try and avoid hostilities. I had to press the assault before you contacted Shakuras, I do not wish to have the golden armada falling upon me because of my past after all." This seemed to shock the zealot's present and the leader seemed conflicted for a few moments.

Seeing he wasn't totally convinced, Kerrigan decided to take a bit more of a risky tactic and spoke up once more. "If you wish I can show you my memory of the event to convince you of my truthfulness, though I would need you word of honour not to attack me whilst you were looking at it." The reason she added the last bit to her statement was because like Zeratul had required aboard the Leviathan, the viewing of memories between a protoss and a non-protoss required close if not physical contact and would stun her for several moments at the end of the exchange.

That was something that could let the zealot have several free attacks upon her if he wished after the exchange, something that would not do her any good even if her psionics would be able to protect her subconsciously to a certain extent. Asking for the zealot's word of honour was as good as a life oath to the protoss, one they would honour even with their worst enemies, something she knew she classed as these days.

The zealot nodded slowly and stepped forwards, deactivating his psy-blade as he did so to show he was being peaceful. She was now a little apprehensive as she walked to meet the zealot in the middle of the two forces, he was at least a foot taller than she was and broader too. Zeratul might be one of the most skilled and dangerous protoss she had ever faced on the field of battle, but he was also one of the smallest in stature. In what seemed like no time at all the two were stood in front of each other, the zealot looking down at her with a guarded glint in its eye as it raised its hands slowly to engulf Kerrigan's helmet.

There was a flash and suddenly she was amongst her memories of earlier today, and she barely resisted lashing out at the invader reflexively, her past leading to her hating anyone trying to enter her mind for whatever reason. The zealot went over not only what had happened, but also her thoughts and emotions as she spoke to the Templar both before and after the destruction of the psionic towers. Without warning he followed the psychic links that the protoss memories were linked to her in her mind, observing the meeting with Zeratul on the Leviathan in less than a second, before retreating from her mind and releasing his grip on her helmet to step back in a mildly shocked manner.

The zealot turned back to the other protoss and after a few seconds of silence the other zealots deactivated their weapons as well, to the cries of shock and terror from the women and children behind them. The zealot in front of her spoke telepathically to them as she finished recovering from the mind link process, his voice conflicted with emotions. "My brothers, we have been deceived by Templar Fresa, whose hatred of the Queen of Blades has made him forget our mission here and to risk all our lives for his attempts at vengeance, even though it is obvious that our forces are too few and too spread out to stand a chance of defeating this new enemy."

The zealot then turned back to Kerrigan and spoke seriously once more. "Though, I cannot simply ignore your past as the Terran's around you have Sarah Kerrigan. Your crimes against my race are far too numerous and grievous to try and keep track of and it will take more than words to satisfy the honour of the dead. Your actions here on Kaldir will be the beginning of the judgement against you, what path will you take yourself upon I wonder?"

He gestured at the civilians behind him, concern for the first time showing itself in his expressions and tone. "Will you let them live if I convince my other brothers guarding the other buildings to give themselves up peacefully? They came here to find a new life, not to fight the zerg again like we had to on Aiur and Shakuras." Kerrigan nodded slowly, the zealot had reacted much better than she had expected he would have, though she supposed seeing Zeratul aiding her convinced him that she was changing at least.

"I would, but I warn you that I must stop the rest of your forces from contacting Shakuras in any way that is necessary. I cannot have the golden fleet pursuing me as I try and regain control over the zerg. And if that means I must destroy every protoss on this planet I will do so without hesitation." The zealot nodded, obviously expecting as much even as the Terrans advanced to begin sweeping the building for any protoss that had not surrendered or were unarmed.

"If you will permit it, I and the rest of my warriors will return to the camp, there we can try and convince others of Fresa's madness and maybe even remove him from his leadership position, though that is very unlikely. The fact that you seem to have Prince Zeratul's blessing on whatever quest you are pursuing will add some weight to our position, but I imagine that you will be forced to kill the majority of the warriors on this planet to ensure that the fleet is not contacted."

Kerrigan raised an eyebrow at this blasé comment about the deaths of hundreds of his kinsmen. "Does that not concern you; make you think that I haven't changed from the Queen of Blades at all? Surely you must be somewhat angry at me for the actions I must take."

The Zealot nodded but looked away from her towards the unarmed protoss who were still huddled confusedly in the background, a distant tone in his voice as he replied to her statement. "It does anger me, and it goes against every tradition and heritage that the elders have taught me since I started military training not to fight you and the zerg to the last breathe. However, Tassadar also went against our traditions and worked with those we had claimed to be evil eons beforehand, and it is because of him that our race has not been overwhelmed by the enemies that mass against it or succeeded in destroying the overmind like we did on Aiur."

He raised one giant hand to his head, making some sign that Kerrigan did not recognise before continuing. "Therefore, if to secure the future of my race some of those too blind to see their follies must be dealt with, so be it and I will not stand sacrificing our future simply because our leader tells us it is the path we must take." The words struck deep within Kerrigan at her own blind following of Mengsk before Tarsonis, and she winced at her younger self and her naivety.

Raising her hand, she offered it to the protoss to shake. "So, not an alliance between the two of us then, but instead we shall make a truce that shall be honoured between us to ensure that the bloodshed on both sides of this conflict is minimised?"

The protoss did not hesitate, reaching out his hand and grasping hers firmly as they shook. "Something I never thought would even enter my mind, but our goals are aligned at this time. I will work with you Kerrigan and see whether you are worthy of redemption yet…"

Timeskip:

The other defenders had for the most part stood down when the zealot had gone to talk with them, though several of the older zealots had been to fanatical of their hate for Kerrigan and the zerg to see reason, attacking those that had given up for their 'treachery'. It was mostly the younger protoss that had surrendered, many of whom had families here which is why they had resisted the attempts to be gated away from their families and leave them to their fates.

This by no means meant that the protoss were friendly with her and her allies, but they were at least non-violent towards her as they made the journey across the planet into Protoss territory once more. They ended up leaving the civilian protoss, of which there were almost 500 at the base, under light guard at the now established Terran base, which had moved to producing goliaths for her forces to use in the near future using the excess of resources it had gained from the previous battle.

Of course, letting the protoss to live had produced very different reactions from those in her camp. Abathur had been most disappointed not to at least get some to experiment upon, whilst Izsha was unable to comprehend why she had let them live considering the Queen of Blades memories. Surprisingly Za'gara had not been as against it this time as she was the previous times, though the reasons behind her doing so became clear as Kerrigan stepped back onto the Leviathan, only to find herself confronted by an imprisoned protoss female stood near Izsha.

Za'gara spoke up quickly as she strode towards the group of them, the Brood mothers voice full of obvious glee as she spoke up. "We encountered this one with a group of other protoss on our side of the ice cliffs my Queen, though her companions tried to fight their way to an escape and my brood were forced to kill them. This one was unarmed however and I thought she would be useful for you to interrogate about the Protoss defences."

Kerrigan wondered whether the protoss had actually attacked first or whether Za'gara was manipulating the version of events to her favour, but there was nothing she could do about it for the moment. Instead she decided to try and be tactful with the brood mother for the moment. "I didn't think that taking prisoners was your style Za'gara, after all your protests on Char about the Terrans…"

The Brood mother nodded her head respectfully towards her though her tone held no note of submission to accompany the gesture. "I have come to the conclusion that your reasons for taking the prisoners and making them your allies must be to do with this idea of vision which you claim is the reason for your strength my Queen. Therefore I must try and copy your actions until it becomes clear what it is about them that gave you the strength to defeat me, so that I can make those strengths my own. Also, Abathur requested for some protoss to experiment upon, despite his opinion of the unlikelihood of their essence being useful to the future of the swarm."

After stating firmly that none of the surrendered or captured protoss would be experimented upon whilst she ruled the swarm, Kerrigan began to think some more on what Za'gara had been said. The fact that Za'gara wished to gain this power to take down Kerrigan and rule the swarm herself did not need to be stated again, the brood mother had made her intentions clear on that point soon after her defeat and assimilation into the swarm on Char.

It was for that reason that Kerrigan did not point out that vision was not obtained by copying another's actions, it was about following your own ambitions with all of your strength and will, something that Nafash had done spectacularly, bringing her forces to this often forgotten world to try and build up her own swarm, rather than trying to take over what remained of Kerrigan's ruined empire on Char.

Speaking of Nafash, Izsha spoke up softly, stretching her body out from the body of the Leviathan to approach Kerrigan. "My queen, Nafash is recovered to the point that she has joined with the swarm once more, and once she realised it was you who controlled the swarm she stopped her attempts to subvert it to her own will. She has sent a request to you for permission to view the swarms memories so that she can understand how you survived the events on Char and the events that led up to your rescue of her so she can understand better how to serve you when she recovers."

Kerrigan smiled, this was the type of subordinate that she could get used to, and she nodded affirmatively to Izsha. "Inform her that she is allowed to access any memories of the swarm she wishes, and that if she wishes to ask anything else in future she can just ask me directly rather than ask you to do in her stead. She impressed me with most of her actions on Kaldir and her idea of a more elite swarm like she seemed to have been working towards is most impressive if not practical given her limited supplies of biomass."

Izsha nodded once more and retreated back to her original position, allowing Kerrigan to stride forwards and approach the captured protoss, who froze in an obviously terrified manner as Kerrigan reached up and touched its cheek. The protoss was obviously female, dressed in the robes of a civilian as opposed to a soldier or pilot, leading Kerrigan to wonder what she was doing so far away from the protoss bases with the feral zerg still a threat.

Caressing the Protoss' cheek once more, she could not help the small feeling of glee that rose in her chest as she flinched away from the motion before she squashed it and withdrew her hand. That was something the former Queen of Blades enjoyed immensely, seeing the fear and helplessness in her victims eyes before she crushed them, and Kerrigan would not be the same as her if she could help it.

Bringing her hand back to her side she nodded to the protoss. "En taro Adun, I think you already know who I am so I will skip the introductions and instead ask a question of you. If you answer it to my satisfaction I will release you from your bindings and we will continue our chat in a more comfortable location." Seeing the protoss was still terrified of her she realised that she would need to reassure the woman that she would remain peaceful and not torture her for information. "I also promise that you will not come to any harm in my care aboard this ship if you cooperate with me."

The protoss women looked unsure for several moments before nodding slowly her ascent and straightening from her slightly cowering position and looking Kerrigan straight in the eye, the earlier fear repressed impressively to the point that it was barely visible to Kerrigans eyes. "I am Lasarra, and I know who you are Queen of blades. What is it you will ask of me before I die?"

Not the reaction that Kerrigan quite expected from the woman who had been cowering slightly from her mere moments before, but she commended the protoss' courage in front of what she perceived to be a slow and painful death and the rebellious tone in her telepathic voice. She shook her head and looked out of the mouth of the leviathan for a moment before answering her question.

"You shall not die here unless you wish for it to be so, or if I let you go and you return to the fools that wish to sacrifice their lives contacting the golden armada to come and annihilate me. My question is a simple one, what are you doing on this planet? Given the number of civilians that my forces have encountered whilst destroying the psionic towers, this was no mere expedition to log the life forms of this planet for the protoss archives."

Evidently mentioning the civilians was a bad idea as Lasarra winced and immediately turned away from Kerrigan and refused to answer, taking the wrong assumption that Kerrigan had not realised she had hinted to the woman. Realising that she would get no more out of her for the moment, but intrigued by the woman enough to not merely release her, she tapped her communicator and contacted Sergeant Jacobs, one of the few firebats that had joined her forces and now headed the Leviathan security detail as Mendez had termed it.

"Sergeant, I need you to grab a few marines and come to the bridge, we have a protoss aboard that I want to be escorted to our quarters and then kept under guard until she calms a little and answers my questions. If you need to you can call Izsha and she will provide some zerglings that will follow your orders." The Sergeant, who had been one of Raynors rebels before he had been captured and given the choice between death by firing squad or death by being a firebat, spoke with the typical husky voice of a man long addicted to cigarettes.

"Of course general, do you want me to have one of the medics come with us? I mean they don't know much about Protoss stuff but the prisoner might respond better to a less… powerful person." Kerrigan knew he meant someone who didn't have her past with his comment but was grateful he hadn't just come out and said it like some of the Terran's had done until they worked out how much it hurt her to hear it every time.

"That sounds good, tell Izsha to release her when you arrive and she is all yours, I need to do some other duties before I can devote some more time to Lasarra here." Reaching the fleshy wall that served as a doorway to the rest of the bio-ship, she turned and decided to give Lasarra one last point to think of before leaving her in Jacobs hands for the time being.

"Lasarra, just so you don't think any worse of me then you already do, the civilians are still alive that I encountered down on Kaldir today, despite your commander choosing to abandon them to my forces rather than try and extract them with his men as they withdrew…"

And with that she strode from the room without waiting for a reply, not that she needed one as she could feel the shock emanating psionically from Lasarra, a small smirk rising to her face as she realised for the first time in a long time that she could enjoy trading words with someone other than Jim…

Timeskip:

Persona Change: Lasarra

Sitting on the chair like object in the centre of the room that she had been escorted to by half a dozen humans of all things, Lasarra did not know what to think any longer. Captured by the zerg and having seen her escort slaughtered to a man was something that had been the worst nightmare for any sane protoss for many years. But instead of being ripped to shreds by the zergs claws she was brought to their ship and imprisoned there for several hours without explanation or reason before _she_ appeared at the entrance to the room that she was being kept in with several zerg type creatures that she had never heard of before.

The Queen of Blades certainly looked a lot different to how she had been described by the protoss reports given by survivors that had fought her in the previous decade, but there was no mistaking the overwhelming presence that had washed over her with the woman's entrance. Lasarra wasn't proud to admit it but she had cowered a little in the woman's shadow when she had approached her, flinching when the Queen of Blades reached up and stroked her face in an almost familiar manner.

The conversation had also been different than Lasarra had expected, short and the only thing she had been asked why the protoss were on the planet with so many civilians with them. The way it had been mentioned made Lasarra sick on the inside, there was no guilt or feeling for the deaths of so many young and innocent protoss, and she had refused to answer, determined not to give the monster anything before she died.

That was what she thought anyways, only for the monster to surprise her with her last words and then to be brought to a far more hospitable location by humans that seemed to follow the Queen of blades willingly. It was Kerrigan's last words to her that had caused her current emotional turmoil, could she be telling the truth about the civilians not being killed? Was this all part of some elaborate strategy that the Queen had concocted to lull the remaining protoss into surrendering before killing them all?

Obviously her nervous shifting had been noticed by one of the humans, a man in large red painted armour who gestured at her to one of the other humans, who approached slowly with some cloth in her hands. "Would you like me to dress those wounds for you… sorry I don't know how to address you." Lasarra could feel the nervous energy coming off the young human in front of her and though she was loathe to talk with those following the queen of Blades she could sense no hidden motive from the woman, so decided to reply rather than alienate a potential ally.

"You can call me Lasarra child, and I do not understand what you mean by dressing my wounds, I assume this is a Terran term?" The wounds the woman was referring to were those left by the tendrils that had imprisoned her before she had met the Queen of Blades, each tendril having teeth which had dug into her flesh in order to dissuade her from moving too much. The wounds were not particularly deep however, so Lasarra could not understand why the human was concerned with them.

The woman seemed to understand however and held up the cloth and pointed to it helpfully. "Dressing a wound means disinfecting the wounded areas and then covering them in bandages, this will reduce the chance of infection and help the wounds recover faster."

Lasarra must admit she was surprised at the Terran's words, because the protoss did not suffer from an illnesses or infections in the same way that Terran's did they never really saw the need to do anything other than let their wounds heal up in their own time unless they were particularly life threatening and then usually warrior protoss were often transferred to an immortal or a stalker.

She nodded her head, interested to see what happened next with the unfamiliar treatment. The woman than drew out several other items from the large belt pouches she had at her waist and worked on her wounds as Lasarra watched in the kind of devout attention she usually only reserved for the ancient texts. When the woman sprayed some kind of liquid upon her wounds there was a sharp pain that she jerked from, but after the woman apologised in a worried tone Lasarra simply asked what the liquid was for.

Ten minutes later her legs were wrapped up in the cloth that the Terran had referred to as bandages, and though there was no immediate change Lasarra had realised that this was not going to be an instant fixing technique. Before the woman could stand to leave Lasarra reached forwards and placed a hand on her shoulders, noticing the other Terrans instantly turn weapons on her in an experienced and cautious manner.

Raising the hand back away cautiously she spoke to the room at large rather than specifically to one of the Terrans this time. "Apologies, I merely was hoping to ask a couple more questions about… well my captor and why you follow her given her past." The Terrans all looked at the only Terran not to react to her movement, the red armoured one who simply stared at her for a moment before nodding his head at the door, the other Terrans saluting and moving quickly out of the room, leaving her with just the two Terrans.

Projecting her thanks to the larger Terran she turned back to the Terran woman who had not moved from her crouched position other than to look at the larger Terran. Realising that the Terran was still nervous of her, she decided to try the same approach she had seen protoss mothers use with their children during their travels on the colony ship, and beckoned to the area on the seat next to her with one hand.

The Terran seemed to understand what she meant and moved to where she had indicated whilst replying to her earlier comment. "What did you want to ask me about the General? I mean I have only encountered her on Char before now so I am not sure how much use I will be." Lasarra was pleased by the answer, it was a sign that the woman hadn't been put up to this by The Queen of blades, another point in the woman's favour, though it was still a much tilted scoreboard against the former human.

"Perhaps you can tell me about why you call her this title, the General? From my studies of your kind it seemed to me to be a rank in your military…" And thus Lasarra started to dig for incriminating evidence of the Queen of Blades fooling them all once more, unaware of the fact that Jacobs was watching the encounter with a smile of his own underneath his visor. Things were going exactly according to plan…

Persona Change: Sarah Kerrigan

Having finished the patrol routes with Mendez so that the Terran's and the zerg were not wasting manpower by patrolling the same areas near their bases too regularly, Kerrigan felt Nafash's presence begin to awaken in the evolution chamber. Leaving Za'gara and Mendez to manage the rest of the deployments as well as to keep an eye for the protoss commanders next move, she made her way hurriedly through the Leviathan to the evolution chamber just in time to catch the chrysalis beginning to open and reveal the brood mother within.

To Sarah's surprise Nafash was considerably changed from what the other queens and brood mothers that she had encountered in her time since being the Queen of blades. The spider-like feet that the other brood mothers had and the interlocking skin had been replaced by something entirely new, and there were other notable changes to Nafash that Kerrigan noticed almost straight away.

She walked like a Terran horse, with four hoof-like legs that had a layer of claws extruding from the bottom of them to obviously aid in gripping surfaces such as the icy ground of Kaldir. She was also more humanoid in appearance, with a protoss looking blank face on top of a heavy-set torso that was covered in the same fur that Kerrigan's forces had grown after absorbing the Ursadon essence.

Three pairs of claws were withdrawn near her back, similar to the wings that the Queen of Blades used to have, and a pair of remarkably human hands covered in the same fur as her torso finished off the rather weird looking but fitting body in front of Kerrigan. **(Think a centaur but with thick fur and a zerg like appearance.)**

She was therefore smaller than Za-gara was by a considerable margin but her new evolution was obviously built with speed and resistance to the cold in mind rather than controlling the swarm and expanding creep as Kerrigan had originally intended the brood mother's evolution to focus upon. Nafash took a couple of unsteady steps forwards out of the opened chrysalis before her two sets of yellow cat like eyes noticed Kerrigan's presence in the chamber.

Nafash immediately tried to bow in the same manner that the brood mothers had whenever in her presence, only to stumble to a kneeling position as her front legs gave out on her unexpectedly, leaving her looking up apologetically as she spoke telepathically to Kerrigan. "General Kerrigan, I apologise for my ineptness in this form, but it is much different than my previous one and it will take some time to get used to. How may I serve the swarm?"

Kerrigan got over her shock at the new form in front of her and had several questions of her own to be answered before she could reply to Nafash's own query. "Why the new form Nafash? And you are the first zerg to address me as anything other than the Queen of blades or some other variant, why is that?"

Nafash found her way back to her feet though still kept her head lowered as she replied. "I refer to you by the title you seem to prefer in your memories, when the other zerg or your enemies refer to you as the Queen of blades you seem saddened, whilst your memories around your new Terran allies seem to be more preferred by you. I apologise if I have jumped to the wrong conclusion…"

Kerrigan was surprised that Nafash had gleaned so much from her memories already, but unlike Za'gara Nafash seemed capable of lateral thinking so she quickly clarified her preference so that it did not put the brood mother off further ideas. "You are right Nafash, I do prefer the name you have given me, it is a name I made for myself rather than someone else gave me for my past. Please continue to refer to me as such, now explain about your change as it is certainly very different to what I remember."

Nafash nodded her head, obviously pleased that her observation had been correct before gesturing with her hands at the body. "I had been experimenting with various essences that my zerg had obtained before we split from the chaos that occurred after your seemingly permanent death at the hands of the Terrans who invaded our home. First I altered myself to have the abilities of the Stygaxian hide snake, whose ability is to shed its skin in such a manner that the skin still looks lifelike allows it to catch would be predators by surprise after burrowing under its fake corpse. I imagine you saw how useful that was to me when you found my chrysalis."

Kerrigan nodded, that certainly explained the corpse that looked a lot like Nafash atop her hiding place. "Then once the protoss began to attack in too great a numbers I knew that they would eventually start hunting me so that they could break the bond I had with my zerg and leave them much easier to defeat as a whole. So I devised my own death so that the protoss would call off their hunt and I could then return and take as many of my swarm into hiding as I could until the protoss left or we built up enough biomass to be able to fight the protoss again."

Nafash rubbed her hands over the fur covered arms she had before finishing her tale. "This form was meant to be my new evolution for better leading my swarm; it reduced my psionic power and the number of zerg that I could control. But considering I intended to have a smaller more elite zerg force like those of the Terran mercenaries I have encountered in your service the benefits to my speed, endurance and durability on Kaldir outweighed those costs the evolution brought me. I hope my hasty work does not displease you too much General."

Kerrigan shook her head even as Abathur crept forwards from the background his fleshy mandibles rustling as he examined Nafash's form. "Evolution messy, many strands not properly spun and joined. But considering time issues and stress of battle… Impressive work for one of such inexperience, possibly can help Abathur develop new ideas for swarm's evolution. Permission to clean up new forms DNA so that she can assist you to her maximum potential?" Kerrigan nodded but spoke to Nafash one last time before leaving her to the geneticist's overeager tendrils.

"You will come see me when he is done Nafash; you did very impressive work before my arrival on this planet. You were intelligent, careful and tenacious with your plans against the protoss, and even managed to explain away your only mistake with your strategy with your escape plan, even though without my presence you would probably still have died out there in the wilderness. You have all the makings of a good leader and I plan on taking advantage of that."

Nafash looked pleased at the praise and bowed her head once more before calling out her own final question. "General Kerrigan, what was the mistake I made with my plan in your eyes?" Kerrigan paused at the door before looking back with a smile. "You ran away…" And she then stepped out, eager to avoid another incident with Abathur trying to turn her zerg once more; she could come back and do the baneling evolution with him later once he finished having fun with Nafash.

Timeskip: Half an hour

Kerrigan returned to the Terran area of the Leviathan in higher spirits than she had been when she started off the day, the battle had gone well and she had gained some influential, if not entirely friendly allies amongst the protoss forces that could help make dealing with the very serious threat of the golden armada somewhat easier and less like a planet wide genocide which it had initially shaped itself up to be when the protoss had first attacked.

The fact that she was facing slowly growing resistance to her methods from Za'gara was something that she could deal with, especially with Nafash's return to the swarm. Izsha had also struggled with the idea of allies amongst the other races but that was more due to how she had been created and the memories that the Queen of Blades had given her. Perhaps if she put her own now human memories into Izsha it would help the zerg woman understand better what she was doing.

The Leviathan door opened as she approached, the two marines standing guard outside it saluting her as she walked through. Walking through the living and sleeping area that the Terran's were using she greeted several of them that she had fought with that day or had befriended on Char, but she couldn't stay and chat with them until she found out what had happened in regards to Lasarra. Asking about the protoss woman quickly had her directed in the direction of the med-bay section of the Terran quarters, though why she would be there even with Jacob's permission was lost on her.

Entering the med-bay, which was the only actual structure in the area that was fully Terran, built inside the Leviathan to provide a clean area in which wounded Terrans could recover from their wounds with less chance of airborne infection, Kerrigan found Jacobs and Horace stood watching from an observation window to her left, talking quietly about something. Both of the men were now out of their respective heavy armours and dressed in military fatigues.

Horace noticed her presence first as she approached them and snapped off a salute, Jacobs turning and doing the same in a far more relaxed manner, the man not looking particularly happy with something, though that could simply be the fact that Mendez had banned smoking in the med-bay. Rather than talking straight away, Kerrigan instead looked through the window to see what was inside that had two of her top officers so interested.

It was the room of one of the marines that had been badly injured earlier today by stalker fire, and whilst two of the medics were in there giving treatment to his wounds, Lasarra was stood behind them, looking over their shoulders curiously. "She is a researcher general, and was fascinated when the medic I had brought with me offered to bind the wounds on her legs. She has been doing her best since then to exhaust the medic's knowledge of battlefield treatments and dangers whilst throwing in probing questions about you and your plans for the planet and beyond, but nothing malicious or dangerously classified in nature."

That was Jacobs, straight to the point as usual and more than prepared to make his own judgement calls on matters. Horace observed Lasarra a moment longer before speaking his own opinion. "She is highly intelligent and very creative with her ideas and opinions on matters. She has already suggested several ways in which our surgical lasers could be made more efficient or powerful, though most would require collaboration between us and some protoss scientists for an extended period to be tested, something rather unlikely to happen at the moment."

Kerrigan nodded, glad to see that Jacob's idea had borne fruit in relaxing Lasarra's guard around them, perhaps this would allow Kerrigan to begin talking to the woman herself, she had to admit she was a little eager to talk with a protoss of high intelligence that wasn't trying to take her head or confuse her with riddles and visions that explained nothing about their purpose and aim. Flaring her psionics slightly, it had the desired effect of causing Lasarra's head to shoot up and look cautiously in her direction.

Deciding to initiate the conversation between the two of them before Lasarra got too worried about her watching; Kerrigan spoke telepathically to her, trying to keep her tone neutral so that she did not make Lasarra even more suspicious by accident. "I hear you have been busy this evening, I hope that you have found our technology interesting."

If Lasarra picked up on her deliberate inclusion of herself in the Terran ranks, she showed no sign as she replied somewhat tentatively. "Yes, it is so different to my own kinds, but I suppose that is to be expected considering how few of the Terrans are blessed with psionic powers. Do you wish for me to return to my holding area now? I hope you are not angry at the Jacobs person for letting me come here, I only wished to learn more."

The idea of psionics being a blessing was something that Kerrigan had very mixed feelings about, after all her powers had saved her from her abusive father when she was young but had also directly led to her being turned into the Queen of Blades. She was also surprised to hear the slight hint of worry in Lasarra's voice about Jacob's decision; she didn't seem that kind of commander did she?

But she supposed that Lasarra was rather cleverly testing whether she was or not with her question and her actions, her opinion of the protoss woman's deviousness moving up another couple of notches even as she replied evenly. "Lieutenant Jacobs is more than authorised to let you move where ever you wish as long as you do not threaten the lives of any of his and therefore my men. In regards to you I do not intend to imprison you unless you wish me to, but I would like to try and understand some more things about you and your mission to this planet. Would you care to accompany me for a walk so that we can discuss things?"

Lasarra still looked unsure but slowly nodded her assent, realising that it hadn't really been a request that Kerrigan had made, more of an order. The protoss spent a few moments stating her goodbyes to the two medics before moving to the door of the room as Kerrigan spoke to tell the two lieutenants what had just happened. "Lasarra and I will be talking together privately, so I will return her to you when I am finished, is there any other business we need to discuss?"

Both men shook their heads and bid their leave even the door opened with soft expelling of air, Lasarra stepping out with only a hint of apprehension visible in her body language, striding up to Kerrigan and bowing her head respectfully. "Where do you wish to go General?" The use of her preferred title made Kerrigan smile slightly even as she indicated that they should start walking out of the medical bay once more.

They walked in silence out of the Terran quarter and into the rest of the Leviathan, heading to a small room that was not far from the Terran quarter, which would serve as a bio-storage area once more was gathered. Entering the room, Kerrigan was surprised that Lasarra spoke without any pressure from her, though the protoss woman stayed facing away from her for the moment.

"The Terrans seem to think that I have judged you too harshly, that you have changed considerably since something happened to you on Char. So, in light of this as well as what Jacobs told me about his personal past with some of the more… zealous of my kind and how they approached a zerg infestation, I wish to try and understand your reasons for wishing to change as you have. It is not like you have some higher law or person of authority to keep you from performing however you think is best…"

Kerrigan couldn't help but snort at this drawing a confused look from Lasarra, the woman had no idea how wrong she was about that, though she wondered which Jim's ideals counted as these days. "I suppose higher law would certainly be one way of putting it, but first, why don't you tell me about what Sergeant Jacobs said to you in order to change your mind? I do not know the pasts of my men as much as I would like at this point, and it must have been an interesting tale indeed."

Lasarra was obviously intrigued about what Kerrigan had meant by higher law, but she seemed to realise that Kerrigan was trying to start them off on a conversation topic that she could discuss without feeling like she was being pressured or forced to reveal secrets about the protoss presence here. She nodded her head slowly to Sarah before speaking once more. "It was when I asked why you had attacked us as the medic finished treating my legs…"

*Flashback*

"But if she has changed so much from how she used to be, why did she attack us as she did today? We were no threat to her, but that hasn't stopped her before has it?" It was only as she finished speaking her question did Lasarra realise she might have overstepped the line, her projected question causing the medic to stiffen even as the red Terran growled audibly at her.

"The general did not attack you today, your warriors tried to attack us soon after we landed, even after Kerrigan tried to speak with your leader to avoid conflict. So do not try and tar her with that brush that your kind are so prepared to throw around, she is certainly better now than those of your kind I have fought before."

He cut off with a sigh before turning and walking towards the door, the medic standing and starting to follow him when Lasarra spoke both out of curiosity and in an attempt to make up for her blunder that risked her becoming isolated. "Wait! I apologise, I suppose I am speaking from a very limited point of view. Please, forgive me for my words." The red man paused and seemed to take several deep breaths before turning back and indicating to the medic to return to the seat.

Seeing the man was willing to give her another chance at least, Lasarra knew she had to think carefully about what she said next lest she say the wrong thing once more and make things even worse during her captivity. Finally she decided to first try and understand what the red man had meant about her race, as that would allow her to expand her views on how her race and the terrans had interacted previously. This would be useful as it was something that she had never found interesting enough to cover properly before now. "May I ask what the protoss have done to give you such a low opinion of us? I am not knowledgeable of our interactions with the Terrans..."

The red man strode over and his helmet moved up to reveal his face, scraggly brown hair framing a scarred face and cigarette smouldering in between his lips as he looked at her sternly with his dark green eyes. "I could go on about your kinds actions when the zerg began to attack us with the Overmind still in control, but I was too young to be able to have been involved in that personally. I will instead focus on the time that I had signed up under James Raynor to fight against Mengsk's oppression, you know of the man I am sure..."

Lasarra nodded, Jim Raynor was as much a legend to the protoss as any of their own commanders bar Tassadar, considering his actions in helping defeating the Overmind and then also taking down The Queen of Blades a few months before hand, though this was now obviously not the case. Seeing this brought a small smile to the mans face even as he stepped back, blowing the smoke from his cigarette into the air around them.

"Good, the man was a true leader, fighting from the front lines if he thought the mission was too dangerous for us to do ourselves. This was also the case when we were helping some of our colonists settle on a new world away from the zerg attacks that had been plaguing them. There were a few that were still infected but these had been quarantined whilst the scientists worked on a cure for the zerg infection. But before they could make any headway on the problem, guess whose fleet turns up in orbit and delivers the ultimatum to us of abandoning the colonists to be purged or be drawn into battle with them, and then begins torching settlements with some huge craft without letting Jim try and talk with them."

Lasarra was shocked by the news but not overly surprised, the protoss had always taken the zerg threat very seriously, and if there was the possibility of a full on outbreak occurring there was no chance they would leave such a threat to grow. Before she could speak of this the man kept talking, his tone becoming harsher as he obviously relived the memories of what had happened to him. "We fought for two straight days before our vikings managed to bring the bloody thing down, we lost nearly half our men and there were over forty thousand civilian casualties, all because your leader decided that a few hundred infested that were secured were a great threat to the entire galaxy. The worst of it was that after the battle your leader came on and congratulated his fighting skills, as if it were some game to be played with toy figures!"

He paused, breathing deeply round the cigarette before looking her in the eye with a serious expression on his face. "So I tell you why I think Kerrigan has taken the actions she has today, what do you think will happen to us Terrans, the ones she saved and have willing followed her despite her past? Your fleet will slaughter us all like dogs simply because we chose to give her a chance once more, and I imagine they will not stop there. They will take this as a sign that we Terrans have been corrupted and try to wipe us out. So between a couple of thousand protoss who are too trapped in their ways to see reason and the millions who stand to die if we do nothing to stop them, I am proud to be helping Kerrigan!"

Lasarra didn't respond for several long seconds, her mind processing the thoughts of the man in front of her in an attempt to prove him wrong with logical thought. She couldn't however, whilst the presence of the Terrans would probably not spark off the war that the man feared, it would certainly cause the Protoss higher ups to take an even harder line in dealing with any Terrans they deemed a threat, and that would be just as bad...

*Flashback End*

Kerrigan was surprised at Jacobs thoughts on her actions, and then felt very guilty once more as she realised that she had not in fact been thinking at all about the Terrans under her command when she had led the assault on the Protoss towers, it had been all about her own survival over anything else. She knew that part of that was because for the last few years, there had been no-one else than Jim, and he had always had the 'I can take care of myself' aura that had always inspired her.

She looked up at Lasarra after a few moments, seeing the protoss woman staring at her and made herself the promise that she would change once more, taking Mengsk down was not only her goal now. She had people prepared to follow her for it and they deserved her attention as well, just like they would under Jim. "I will be honest with you Lasarra, before you told me that, I had prevented your leader contacting Shakuras out of self preservation, nothing more and nothing less."

She held up her hand to forestall any response that she might get before continuing once more, looking down at her human form with a sigh. "I forget that I am human for the most part now,the feelings of my zerg self are very powerful, and I often wonder whether I take them just because if I do it makes it easier to ignore the emotions I feel. But since Char, it has become easier and easier to ignore the urges." She moved her hand towards Lasarra, who looked at it nervously before Kerrigan clarified. "I want you to see that I am being truthful, and that I am trying to change who I was Lasarra."

As Lasarra took her hand somewhat apprehensively, Kerrigan looked her in the eye once more before speaking the word that she had heard from Zeratul only a few days beforehand, when he had done a similar thing to her. "Believe!" And then the memories began, Kerrigan guiding Lasarra to the ones she felt were most relevant, hoping that this would be enough to prove herself to the woman, and hopefully gain another ally in her fight against Mengsk...

Persona Change: Arcturus Mengsk, leader of the Terran Dominion

It was dark over Korhal now, with the lights of the cities buildings replacing the glow of the red sun that the planet orbited around. Looking over what he considered to be his crowning achievement from his private command room, Arcturus couldn't help but feel agitated with the events of the previous year. Despite his best efforts to save the dominion from the zerg menace at the hands of Sarah and her lapdog Jim Raynor, Tychus had failed to eliminate the woman when she was weak from the after effects of the Xel'naga artifact and the two had escaped Char whilst he was still reeling from the completely unexpected uprising which came after Raynors storming of the Korhal communications centre.

His decision to use the psi emitter on Tarsonis was not a moment he would ever be able to forget, but to defeat the confederacy extreme measures were required and he had been the one forced to make the call. The loss of Sarah Kerrigan and her transformation into the thing that had been leading the zerg forces in the region had weighed heavily on him for all these years, but he knew he owed it to his old subordinate to release her from the zerg infestation entirely, even if it meant ending her life to achieve it.

The most recent news from his forces was very mixed and the cause for his discomfort even as he poured himself another glass of whisky, the same brand he had drunk when he was leading the sons of Korhal despite his change in status. Whilst Nova had reported capturing Raynor and subduing the Umojan rebels that his spy had revealed, she had been unable to deal with the majority of Raynors raiders or destroy the Hyperion to completely remove the thorn that had been at his side for so many years now. Not too mention that Kerrigan had escaped from the facility and had rejoined the zerg, proving that he had been right in not trusting her.

The loss of General Warfield and the troops on Char had been another blow to the strength of the dominion, especially with so many of his men abandoning him and escaping rather than fighting as they should have. He had dealt with those that had led this desertion quickly enough, he could not afford such actions to be encouraged if another fight with Kerrigan and her zerg forces was to erupt in the near future. He had swiftly deployed his best fleet to Char once the news of it falling had reached him in the hope he could catch Kerrigan before she could reunite the zerg against him.

He knew that despite her infestation the woman still hated him for abandoning her to the zerg, and that was without the piece of propaganda he had sent out about killing James Raynor. The information had been released on his order in the hopes of making Kerrigan throw herself against his forces in a suicidal rage considering the twos previous obvious feelings for each other, but that hadn't happened. Instead after destroying his outpost on Char, the woman had disappeared with all the remaining zerg that had been scattered across the planet's surface.

Putting down his drink with a sigh, he set to work, his plan to defeat Kerrigan and the threat of the zerg once and for all evolving constantly as he took into account data from his tactical readouts, maybe he needed to offer a more tempting piece to the board in order to draw Kerrigan into his trap. Looking down at the profiles of his available forces, he suddenly smiled as he realised exactly who it was he needed to draw out the foul serpent lurking in the shadows. He leaned back to look at a chessboard he had set up to one side, moving one of the white rooks to take a pawn and force a check on the black king. The Black queen had no choice other than to take the rook even though it would then in turn be taken by his own queen, leaving him with a victory that would leave him remembered as the saviour of humanity...

Timeskip:

Persona change: Sarah Kerrigan, General of the zerg

It was the next day that the protoss forces made their next move to try and contact Shakuras, which had been more than enough time for Kerrigan to properly consolidate her forces and truly cement her control over the remnants of Nafash's brood in the region, including a brood of feral hydralisks that had hidden itself to the south of Nafash's base away from the protoss patrols. These powerful long ranged fighters allowed Kerrigan to effectively counter air units without relying upon the rather limited Terran forces that she had at her command or doing it personally.

This turned out to be highly advantageous as she worked out what the next Protoss plan of contacting Shakuras was going to be. The first warning she got was whilst she was overlooking the Protoss defences from her forward base, when a psionic presence of a High Templar appeared in front of her and spoke to her hurriedly as her marine guards raised their weapons warily. "Kerrigan! I am High Templar Doresk. Those of us who think that High Templar Fresa has lost his mind have moved from his main encampment and have taken a hill several miles to the south of his position. However, even as he marshals his loyalist forces against us, he also intends to use the warp portals that were built here eons ago to contact Shakuras."

She sighed, it had been her hope that her memories would have been enough to curtail the protoss problem but it seemed to not be the case. "What are these Warp portals you mention then Templar? Can we just destroy them and rid ourselves of this problem?" The templar shook his head and gestured over at a small hillock about half a mile to the Northwest. Extending her mind, Kerrigan could feel a psionic presence there that was building rapidly, the ice melting visibly even from this distance to run down the hill in small rivers as it revealed a set of giant circular rings.

The Templar gestured at it cautiously before turning back to face her. "If you destroy them the backlash will alert Shakuras that something is wrong and they will embark here with all speed. However, it takes specialised transports to be able to pass through the portals, and the materials required to make them are limited even to our kind. Therefore Fresa can only produce a dozen of these transports before he exhausts his supplies..."

The Templar then left without saying anything further, but it was clear how Kerrigan needed to proceed for this next battle. Gesturing to one of her marines she began to give her orders. "Get Mendez to start scanning for the Protoss bases, both of them. I will get the swarm to the warp portal to set up a blockade, we cannot let anything get through them." With the marine nodded and already on his communicator, Kerrigan set herself down on the floor, reaching out to give her own orders to the zerg and her brood mothers as she readied herself to end this farce once and for all...

**A/N: Wow, thats a lot of words for what is in essence one missions worth of plot... I may do a bit of abridging in the next chapter to get Kaldir finished with, otherwise it will kill all the drive I can summon for it. In regards to the protoss, what did people think? There will be some survivors (Possibly...) but there is very much the hatred of the zerg and Kerrigan present. Nafash surviving and evolving is something I just came up with as it fits with her backstory on the planet and would explain why she was so far away from her own undamaged base. Tell me what you think and feel free to pass on ideas about how to deal with the rest of Kaldir and then Zeras... What is Mengsk planning I wonder, will Lasarra survive and accompany Kerrigan?**

**Review, and then tune in next time for some more Queen of Hearts :) (It might be awhile though, I have really lost a lot of interest in writing recently)**


	4. Closing the book and moving on

**A/N: I'm Back! Well, for this chapter anyways, no promises on a speedy next one. Hope you enjoy it though :)**

Persona- Sarah Kerrigan, Leader of the swarm

"General, the Fresa protoss are trying to force another transport through our defences with the support of their airpower. We are holding them for now but your hydralisks are taking heavy casualties and almost a dozen marines are down and have had to be evacuated. Lieutenant Horace is also reporting heavy casualties amongst the zerg ground forces at the refugee base."

Mendez's voice was punctuated by the additional sounds of gunfire and the heavier sounds of missiles being fired, her report confirming the data that was Kerrigans mind from Nafash, Izsha and Zagara, who were each in charge of sections of the zerg that were currently fighting all across the frozen wasteland, Nafash heading the defence of the Protoss refugee camp, meaning that it was primarily Kerrigan and Zagara that were defending what had originally been the singular portal.

The first battle of the day had progressed much as Kerrigan had imagined it would, her initial charge easily overwhelming the protoss forces in the area surrounding the first warp portal that had been activated and allowing her to call in drones to build up a defensive base around the structure. This had proved to be wise, as rather than deter the protoss from trying to use their transport ships, taking the portal seemed to invigorate their determination to bring her and her swarm down by contacting Shakuras and summoning the golden armada.

Despite their determined assaults both before and during the first two transport runs it had been easy enough for her to hold off their attacks, her hydralisks mixed with spore crawlers were more than sufficient to down the protoss aircraft that were guarding the transports. Then she used her growing psionic powers, which were more than enough to cripple each transport's engines and bring it to the ground, leaving Mendez and the marines to capture the unarmed pilots and crew members.

Both times she had brought down a transport Kerrigan had been forced to the main hive cluster to rest and regain her strength, the use of such sustained and powerful psychic energy was intensely draining for her and would have been tiring even at her full power. She knew that the broodmothers and even Mendez were starting to question whether such exertion was worth the few dozen pilots and crew aboard the vessels, but she knew otherwise.

Glancing across at the now armour clad holographic figure set up in her command room, she inclined her head and spoke tiredly. "Another transport is coming, so I must go and ground it. How is the evacuation of the refugee base going Lasarra? If the remaining forces keep up their attacks I will not be able to support you for much longer with more zerg troops." Kerrigan's former captive inclined her head back, her telepathic voice expressing the surprised admiration that her face could not.

"You would still keep to our agreement even after the effort it takes you to do so? You certainly are trying hard to prove you have changed your ways... Kerrigan. The base is mostly evacuated and once that is completed then our warriors can join yours on the frontlines. I have a group of scout ships on their way to the warp gates now and they will reach your position at the same time or shortly after this transport. Their missiles should be able to target the ships engines and force them to ground quickly, so you can concentrate your powers elsewhere."

That was the first piece of good news Kerrigan had heard all day, it would mean that she could finally leave the transport ships to the protoss. Without the need to keep her powers so defensively she could concentrate on leading her forces against the hangars the ships were made in and therefore stop their production altogether.

The reason she had gone to such effort to not destroy the transports had been due to a conversation the two women had shared even as the first transport had approached her first line of defences.

*Flashback*

As she strode forwards, a small brood of hydralisks slithering up in the shadow of Kaldir's pale and weak sun, Kerrigan was surprised when the voice of Lassara spoke in her head. Wondering how the protoss woman had enough psionic strength to speak to her from orbit, she traced the connection and found the woman aboard one of the Medivacs that had brought down the marine re-enforcements moments before to be her second line of defence.

"General, you must not destroy those transports! They are manned by civilians alone who have no part in what High Templar Fresa is doing." The desperate pleading in the womans voice served the purpose of assuring Kerrigan that the woman was at least not joking around with her impossible request, but she didn't bother concealing her raised eyebrow as Lassara came to a stop in front of her.

"That is all very well as a request, but how do you propose for me to stop the damn things from reaching Shakuras then if I cannot destroy them Lassara?" Lassara stood there for a few moments before dropping her head in defeat. " I do not know, but there must be a way it can be done!" Kerrigan knew that it was Jim's ghost resting on her shoulders at that point. Many times he had gone to the aid of those unable to defend themselves, regardless of how impossible the situation was, it was just the man he was.

It was Mendez that broke the silence surrounding the pair, having followed Lassara up to Kerrigan's post at a more sedate pace. " It is a shame we do not have any missile turrets available, something that big could easily be taken down by targeting its engines. That would make it easy to force them down. But as we don't have godly powers to make them appear in front of us, we need another plan to deal with them one way or another... General."

The mention of godly powers had gotten Kerrigan thinking to the powers she had used as the Queen of blades, able to tear asunder Carriers and Battle cruisers with mere gestures certainly counted. Whist she no longer possessed even a fraction of that power, she might be able to do something herself...

*Flashback End*

"That is news I appreciate Lassara, I will deal with this transport ship now then I will need you to make your way back here to help coordinate your forces..." Kerrigan paused as Zagara spoke to her directly, hindering her connection with Lassara but that didn't seem to particularly bother the Zerg broodmother.

"My Queen, there is a strong fluctuation in psionic energies almost a mile and a half from our hive, I suspect it is a second portal that the protoss are activating. I would not be surprised if that is the destination of the next transport..." The almost sarcastic drawl in the broodmothers voice would have brought an amused chuckle to Kerrigan's lips if she wasn't already sprinting to the door, mustering as big an attack force psionically as she felt able.

The last thing she wanted to do was leave her base dangerously undermanned at this early stage in the battle especially with how exhausted she would be after this little exchange. The zerglings raced ahead as more than a dozen hydralisks fell in behind her. Each species knew their tasks as the first protoss defences round the portal came into place, a pair of plasma cannons that were already taking pot shots at the approaching zerglings.

Blast through the defences as fast as possible, and then the zerglings would hold back any ground attack whilst the hydralisks brought down the protoss air escort, leaving Kerrigan free to concentrate her focus on the transport, bringing it down and then withdrawing before the protoss could counter attack and overrun them...

Time skip- five minutes

That had been the original plan Kerrigan thought bitterly as she fired another kinetic blast at the harrying Stalkers that were hemming in her and her remaining hydralisks. Her forces had smashed through the initial defenders and taken the high rise that the gate was based upon in preparation for the transports arrival.

It had just been confirmed that the transport was set in her direction by Mendez when the protoss had counter-attacked with Archons and zealots in such force that her zerglings had been overwhelmed before the transport had even arrived in the area. The only upside was the zerglings had succeeded in killing enough of the enemy to leave them ill-prepared for storming Kerrigan's position, though that was hardly comforting to Kerrigan as she and the hydralisks stayed in their defensive cover.

Since then the protoss had been probing her position even as reinforcements of her zerg kept attempting to smash through their lines to reach her. But it looked like it would all soon be for naught, the transport was approaching rapidly now and there was little she could do to stop it. Even if she were to break her promise of taking the ship down non-lethally, the protoss air and ground cover would gun her and her troops down well before she would bring the thing down.

The protoss had also been interfering with her psionic powers as best they could, meaning that she couldn't contact any of her followers to get a co-ordinated plan together to turn this catastrophe around. Just as a flicker of doubt began to fill her mind there was rumbling through the earth around her. Standing once more and looking over the rock she was sat behind, Kerrigan saw a wave of mutated banelings detonating their way through the Protoss defences, leading a wave of raptor zerglings and roaches towards her.

These were not ordinary banelings as she had previously generated as part of the swarm however, observing a pair of the creatures leap/bounce dozens of feet to impact right amongst a group of stalkers and high templars. She had to admit their death cries were music to her ears even as a wave of Protoss scouts came over her head, firing their weapons at the protoss escort in a manner blatantly showing their side in the conflict.

"General, we have finished evacuating the Protoss base and came with all haste to aid in your fight." The voice of Nafash was a welcome intrusion as the Zerg in question cantered up the hill behind the overwhelming assault. "Abathur also conveys his apologies for evolving the baneling strand without your consent, but the hunterlings were vital in breaching our way to your position before the transport could break through to Shakuras."

Speaking of the transport, Kerrigan returned her attention to the craft whose shields were flashing under the assault of the scout ships that were weaving between the fire of the remaining escort vessels. She would concern herself with the fact that Za'gara had not seemingly moved any of her forces to relieve her later, though the brood mother was the closest to her embattled position by far.

"Well done Nafash, now let us deal with this transport and then we can begin an attack of our own. From what our scouts have reported, there are several stores of biomass around the area that the protoss have created. I am most interested in sampling these stores for powerful strands, after I consult with Lassara of course to keep her happy..."

Timeskip-

After the arrival of the allied protoss forces along with Jacobs and Nafash with their respective groups the battle had swung quickly in Kerrigan's favour once more. She had destroyed two of the shipyards that were capable of producing the transports surprisingly easily. The protoss defences had been unable to properly deal with the mobility and speed of her zergling and hunterlings.

The two's adaptations ability to traverse impassable terrain with lightning quickness and ease meant that whilst the protoss defensive lines were rapidly reinforcing their front lines, her troops were moving to strike at their vulnerable points from the cliffs around their base.

It was as the last shipyard came into sight that Lassara spoke to her hurriedly once more. "Kerrigan, the remaining loyalists are evacuating all of Fresa's warriors back to the ship. I think he intends to return to Shakuras and personally inform them of your presence. What should we do? What can we do..." The slightly defeated tone in her voice was interesting but not entirely unexpected, fighting so fiercely only for the enemy to succeed by running probably sat no better with the protoss than it did with Kerrigan.

Thankfully the existence of the ship had been one of the first things that the templar Doresk had mentioned after his warp gate warning, otherwise she would not have been prepared for such a move. The Leviathan might have been able to combat the ship in a straight fight, but risks this large were something she was trying to minimise and as such had come up with a different plan.

She looked at Lassara seriously as she considered how to phrase her next couple of statements. "Are there any aboard the ship that are not Fresa's? I have a plan to deal with the threat but you might not approve of its execution..."

One of Lassara's eyebrows rose slightly in questioning before she shrugged uncertainly. "I would have to speak with Doresk but I think all those that are against Fresa came planetside. You have already exceeded any change I could have imagined you undertaking Kerrigan. Whatever you need to do to save us, do it now. I will deal with any consequences on my side."

Kerrigan definitely wouldn't consider it a full change of heart from the protoss scientist, but her attitude shift was certainly worth the amount of effort and biomass she had exerted to try and prove as much to herself as to the Protoss that she had changed. Rather than pushing her luck in order to affirm Lassara's stance on the matter, Kerrigan turned her eyes to the nearby group of zealots and high templar that she had blocked from teleporting away.

The protoss were doing their best to break through her block on both sides, but with the battle pretty much finished Kerrigan could focus fully on her task rather than controlling the swarms of zerg, giving her considerably more power to bring to bear. Thinking of her plan, the main component of which was currently wrapped around her left arm tightly, she couldn't help but smirk at her own creativity. Whilst the protoss could not be infested like the terrans could be and turned to her ends, that wasn't to say she couldn't manipulate their egotistical sense of superiority over that fact to her advantage...

*Timeskip*

Persona- Taerom, zealot of the protoss, follower of high templar Fresa

Taerom could not believe the events of the last cycle. The expeditionary forces had landed on the moon Kaldir under the guidance of High templar Fresa after the drone scouts encountered zerg forces on the moon that would interfere with the research work of the noncombatants. He had been part of the second wave involved in gloriously purging the swarm from the planet so that the colonists could begin to investigate the adaptation of the planets orbit for their purposes.

It had gone brilliantly, the zerg presence crushed and the broodmother hunted until she froze to death, until Fresa suddenly confirmed the presence of the dreaded Queen of Blades on the planet, and her wrath had been too great for any of them too withstand.

Looking at the traitor zealots that had incapacitated him and were currently holding him up, his hatred and zeal only heightened further. If those still loyal to Fresa had not been forced to deal with the traitors and their attempt to side with the enemy they would surely have crushed the Queen of Blades and brought the golden armada down on her forces.

There was still hope though, even with the traitors and the noble deaths of many of the loyal protoss their colony ship was even now escaping so that Fresa could warn Shakuras personally. Therefore as the Queen of Blades approached him he was filled with a grim satisfaction rather than fear, glaring down at her with all the hate he could muster.

"You will not succeed Queen of Blades, even with your victory here your days are numbered, yours and those of your traitorous dogs..." To his surprise the Queen merely smirked at him before raising her left arm to his chest, resting the palm of her hand just below his rib cage.

"You mean your cowardly leaders retreat to his ship and its preparation to return to Shakuras? I have known about that plan from the moment he started withdrawing all of his men from the planet. You are the last of them and his high templar brethren have been attempting to rescue you for almost half an hour. But don't worry, you will see them all again soon. I just need you to give him my parting gift to him from me."

As she finished speaking, the thing on her arm began to uncoil, its small body rising to unveil a mouth filled with rows upon rows of teeth. It leapt forwards and began burrowing into the soft tissue of his stomach, his pained thoughts projecting to the entire room. Then he felt it, the familiar feeling of being gated by the ship teleporters. And he felt fear for the first time in the confrontation as the magnitude of the Queen's plan dawned upon him.

"NO! TEMPLAR, Don't gate..." The rest of his thoughts were jumbled as he passed through space to the Protoss ship, appearing upon one of the exterior teleporter pads. It was testament to how few the remaining loyal protoss were in number that no one was there to see to him.

'Must warn the high templar...' He thought even as he felt the thing inside of him swell and grow once more. He managed three steps before he heard the voice of the Queen of Blades echo around him once more. "Now!" Then his entire being burst into a cacophony of agony, managing to send a single projection out with his remaining strength, hoping the weak burst would be enough to gain the attention of another protoss in the area, before the parasite burst from his chest in a surprisingly small spray of gore, moving on dozens of tiny claws to turn back and face him with jaws aquiver.

Timeskip-

Persona- Sarah Kerrigan

The parasite had done its work brilliantly, infesting the protoss ship thoroughly and destroying its engines thoroughly. It had been risky initially with a zealot coming to investigate the psionic burst the host had managed to emit before expiring. But the parasite had been most thorough with devouring the remains of the host zealot before infesting a nearby Lyote specimen to hide its presence from the protoss.

Of course it did not take long before simple infiltration was no longer possible without risking the parasites discovery and destruction. The saving grace was the giant ursadon specimen that the protoss had brought aboard for scientific investigation. Even as the parasite had infested the thing and taken control of it to crush the nearby protoss forces, Kerrigan stored the genetic information it was obtaining during its infestation. After all, such a mighty beast might be useful as part of the swarm and its leaping charge was a deadly ability.

After defeating the protoss guards that had been assigned to watch the Ursadon and slithering away into the ships vents, the parasite had evolved along the parameters she had set it, turning into a new brood mother that she named Niadra. Under Kerrigan's guidance Niadra had continued to wreak havoc through the ship, devouring more biomass from the scientific samples and spawning zerg forces to slaughter the remaining protoss.

She had lost contact with the new brood mother shortly after when the warp power crystals had overloaded with heavy psionic backlash, but she had no doubt that the zerg would be able to overrun the few remaining survivors aboard the ship. She returned to her body with a surprising feeling of sadness rather than satisfaction, a small sigh escaping you as she turned to where Izsha, Mendez and Lassara were stood waiting.

"It is done, the ship will not reach Shakuras and the golden armada will not come." Izsha spoke first as she was psionically connected to Kerrigan and could therefore discern her inner thoughts far more easily. "You seem troubled my Queen, did we not achieve what was needed in slau...stopping the protoss?"

The change in choice of words from the zerg creature was probably due to the new memories that Kerrigan had been slowly feeding to Izsha since she had seen what Nafash had learned from them. Lassara still stiffened at the obvious original wording of that sentence but didn't say anything yet, the woman obviously waiting to see how Kerrigan would respond.

Shaking her head a little Kerrigan tried to clarify to Izsha about why she was unhappy. "Izsha, I will destroy anyone and everything that tries to stand between me and my goals, but the pointless deaths over an old hatred? I don't have to enjoy destroying all those that stand in my way for no reason."

Izsha cocked her head, obviously slightly confused, before asking another question. "But my Queen, what about Arcturus Mengsk? Will you not enjoy destroying him once and for all?" Mendez gave a grim chuckle at this before speaking herself. "She won't be the only one that wants that bastards head on a pike. If she needs a hand I will certainly help put his head there..."

Lassara interjected at this point a confused expression on her face and in her tone. "Who is this Arcturus Mengsk that you seem to hate so much Kerrigan? I hear mention of him amongst the Terrans as well and what they have said about him is venomous to say the least." Well with his actions after Char Kerrigan couldn't say she was surprised that her followers were against the man.

Dredging back up the memories of when Mengsk had rescued her for the first time from the confederacy lab in which they had been experimenting upon her, Kerrigan felt an angry edge to her voice as she relived the hell that had been her life as a ghost of the Confederate forces. "Arcturus Mengsk is the Emperor of the Terran dominion and therefore likes to think of himself as the almighty ruler of the whole Korpulu sector. He rescued me from the Confederacy despite the hatred he held for me for the deaths of his family at my hands some years before."

That certainly got everyone there's attention, it was something that she had long kept secret even after Mengsk had abandoned her to the Zerg. It wasn't out of loyalty to the man or anything like that, but the information seemed unimportant to her as the Queen of Blades and only since Jim had saved her did she come to wonder whether it was simple revenge that had caused Mengsk to leave her on Tarsonis that fateful day.

"Then he and I led the Sons of Korhal to overthrow the Confederacy, and due to his insistence on using a psi emitter to eliminate the Confederate forces through the use of the zerg, I ended up captured by them and became the Queen of Blades. Ever since the events on Char that prompted my disinfestation he has been pursuing me in an attempt to finish me off now that I am weak. So to stop his madness and free us all from his schemes once and for all, I will finish him and his base of power. It's what Jim would have wanted..."

Realising she was becoming dangerously emotional, Kerrigan drew it all back in and reset her mask, the last thing she wanted was for her troops to think she was becoming soft. "Now, We will leave for the zerg homeworld of Zeras the moment all of the Kaldir zerg have been reclaimed. Nafash, Za'gara, how is that proceeding?"

The two brood mothers bowed slightly at her question before Za'gara started speaking. "My Queen, we have almost half of the planets zerg gathered on the leviathan now, but space is slowly running out and we will be forced to leave something behind if we want to fit all the swarm aboard." The brood mothers rather obvious glance at Mendez was not something Kerrigan appreciated, but she knew that Za'gara would not dare step out of line whilst she was so out numbered.

Nafash snorted and spoke her own piece of her report. "Therefore General I have already begun amassing the remaining zerg biomass on the planet to begin forming another Leviathan. I thought that it would be prudent for us to build our forces further in the face of what we are facing ahead. It will take time though General, a week at minimum before the Leviathan is fully formed and ready to leave the planet."

A good plan and one that Kerrigan would probably have ordered anyways with the forces available to her. Looking over to Lassara she decided to inquire about the remaining protoss' plans. "Lassara, what of the protoss? If you wish i can ask for Matt Horner to bring his forces here to pick you up and return you to protoss territory?" The attention seemed to surprise the protoss woman who was still deep in thought.

"Well, I am sure that we can remain here and continue our work with the removal of the zerg forces that were harassing us. I would like to request to accompany you with a small science force of my own however." That request was the first true surprise of the day for Kerrigan and she quirked an eyebrow and smirked slightly. "Why would you wish to accompany me Lassara. Do you not trust that I have changed my ways yet?"

There was a small pause from the protoss before she replied which in many ways answered Kerrigan's question before Lassara said anything. "A small part of that is certainly the case, you have proved that you have changed Kerrigan, but I think there will be times when that resolve waivers. Without those who can remind you of yourself, you may fall into darkness once more and I cannot stand by and let that happen. However, the main reason we wish to accompany you is that you will be travelling to the far ends of the sector and beyond and I imagine you will find many things that would be of great interest to all our races if they are researched properly."

Kerrigan had to appreciate the honesty Lassara had given with her reply and could not think of any reason not to bring the protoss with her, perhaps they would help her understand exactly what Zeratul had wanted from her with his insistence she travel to Zeras. "Very well, you may bring a small group with you on our travels, though I can only offer you quarters with the terrans. Protoss technology and zerg do not go together well i recall..."

With that she dismissed them all so that she could retire for some rest, commanding the zerg aboard the protoss vessel had been draining after the battle on Kaldir, not knowing that many light years away, another council was being held about the fate of the Korpulu sector with far more far reaching consequences for all of its inhabitants...

Space station Arkansas, in orbit over Jupiter-

Twelve figures sat round a large and ornate wooden table. Gathered here were some of the best and brightest of the United Earth Directorates military and scientific leaders. One of them, a man in his mid forties with greying hair and moustache dressed in an admiral's uniform spoke evenly as he gazed round at those with him. "So Admiral DuGaulle and Vice Admiral Stukov have not returned or sent word since their last transmission almost a decade ago? We knew this already and assumed that they had decided to turn renegade with their new minions and that we would deal with them at some point in the future."

There was a morbid chuckle from the man to his second right, a man known only as 'The blade' and headed the UED's ghost programs, himself a highly respected ghost of the insurrection wars almost half a century beforehand. "That was what we thought, but my men have slowly been infiltrating back into the sector and the news they are sending me is disturbing enough that after consulting with General FienHaus we called this meeting to discuss the news fully."

He gestured to a tall blonde woman in a leather armoured trenchcoat and a masterwork bionic eye that glowed yellow in irritation for a moment at being mentioned before shifting her feet off the table where they had been resting as she reclined and allowing her to sit forwards. "Yes, Blade's men have transmitted information that indicates that the UED expeditionary force has not gone rogue as we had formerly anticipated, but instead it has been destroyed by the zerg forces in the region that were under the command of this woman."

The face of the Queen of Blades appeared on the holographic display in the middle of the table, getting a gasp from a few of the members who had been too young to have been a part of the council observing the UED forces reports from the previous incursion. FienHaus paused for a moment to let the murmurs die down before she continued speaking.

"Sarah Kerrigan, a former confederate ghost operative who then defected to the outlawed renegade group the sons of Korhal. We lost track of her for almost a year then, before she resurfaced as this. Known as the Queen of Blades, she was recently killed on the planet of Char by the pirate Jim Raynor. With the zerg in disarray at the loss of its leader Arcturus Mengsk, self proclaimed emperor of the dominion used the opportunity to eliminate Raynor who was the leader of the popular resistance in the Korpulu sector. With the various opposition factors eliminated, the man will now feel secure in his position and start rebuilding the war torn sector and let his guard down. This is our opportunity."

This drew more than a few raised eyebrows from the older hands on the board, after all that had been a similar logic that had been used for the original expedition and they all knew how that had turned out. "Surely you are not suggesting that we assemble another expedition to the area? The failure of the last one cost us a lot of support, if we were to try again and fail..."

The first speaker had been the one to voice this point as he reflexively messed with his moustache and FienHaus noted those that agreed with him even as she was sure he was sizing up her supporters. Admiral Theodore LeBlanc was the most decorated admiral in the UED armed forces and had the scars to prove his experience for each and every one of them. LeBlanc and FienHaus had a rivalry that often polarised the military and political boards that they were on in their endless competition to prove themselves better than the other.

Luckily before the two of them could come to blows over the issue a third voice spoke up, the cybernetically altered voice of the head of Military Research, Harper Reynolds breaking the slowly mounting tension. "I think before we discuss the matter further we should all review the data that Blades operatives have sent us. Let us adjourn the meeting until the next cycle and then reconvene about the matter then."

LeBlanc grumbled about the delay but offered no real objection, whilst FienHaus merely stood and strode off into the recess behind her that led to the door, not allowing anyone to see her bionic eye glow green for a second as she grinned in triumph. The next force would crush those that opposed them and ensure humanity reigned supreme amongst the stars, and her name would be the one forever associated with that triumph.

Blade waited until all the others had left to return to their command posts before signalling to a blank section of wall to his left. "They are gone, you know your orders?" The view of the wall distorted and shifted, revealing a man in commando gear and a complicated piece of electronic equipment strapped to his chest. "Yes master Blade. I am to head to the Korpulu sector and warn the people there of the approaching task force and assist their measures to resist it in any way they can."

Blade nodded his head with a smug smile on his face and the man was gone in a shimmer, his psionic presence disappearing entirely from the elder man's senses. "The perfect assassin and spy for the idiots in Korpulu who rely on psionic senses. All the pieces move into place once more and I will be the one who comes out on top once more..."

Without waiting for or expecting a reply Blade stood and placed his glass on the table, cloaking himself psionically as he moved towards the door. No point in being careless after all...

**A/N: So the horribly pointless conflict on Kaldir comes to a close at last. The survival of the protoss who sided with Kerrigan was not an easy decision, but in the end I preferred the other subtleties that this method allowed me to slide in. On another note... THE UED IS COMING BACK FOR SECONDS! This meeting allowed me to highlight that actually the whole conflict between the three races in the Korpulu sector is not the only event that is going on.**

**Korpulu has been watched by the UED for centuries and is now the perfect hotbed for those amongst the high command that wish to make their names renowned throughout the UED, or those that see it as an opportunity to destroy their rivals politically. Whilst I haven't decided how big a picture the various characters in the UED will play in this story (As an actual UED invasion wouldn't occur till the very end of the HOtS storyline at best), but I like to expand on the universe a bit and this was the easiest way to do it.**

**I have not written properly now in almost 6 months, so this chapter is very tentative. If people don't like it tell me why and I might choose to rewrite it if people can point out any problems I cannot see. Please let me know what you think on the way out Ja Ne!**


End file.
